What World is Left

by Monique Polak

  I try to block the sound by covering my ears. But it doesn’t help. Surely, they are going to kill us. Is this, I wonder, how my life will end? Just like that—without any final words or ceremony of any kind? I try to think of Franticek. I try to remember his kiss, but the fear is too big. It’s swallowing me whole.

  Now there is another plane coming toward me, headed right for where I am crouched on the ground. I flatten myself against the earth. Mother and Theo are with me, but all I can feel is my own heart beating.

  Then, just like that, the airplanes take off, disappearing into the night sky as quickly as they came. My ears are still ringing. “It was just a way to frighten us,” Frau Davidels whispers.

  The night grows even darker. But wherever I look, I see the dim outlines of people.

  “I heard one of the Nazis say there are already three hundred dead,” a voice whispers. Some of the dead are elderly, too weak to last through the second census count. Some are trampled by the crowd. Some give up. The rest are shot.

  When we file past the bodies, we turn our heads away. It is a sign of respect, but I know, too, that not to look at them is also a sign of cowardice. I don’t have the courage to look at the corpses, to see their faces. It is too easy to imagine myself there with them on the wet grass.

  At about four in the morning, an old man with a gray beard pushes his way through the crowd. “What do you want, old man?” someone asks. “Don’t draw attention to yourself or they’ll shoot you. Just like they did to that poor woman before.”

  When the old man turns toward us, I notice his eyes are bright blue. “I’m not afraid of being shot. Besides, I have something to tell you...a message you need to pass on to the others waiting in line.”

  “He’s probably senile,” a woman’s voice calls out. “What does he know?”

  “Hush,” Fraulein Davidels tells the woman. “Don’t you know who the old man is?”

  “Why should I know him?” the woman answers.

  “He’s Rabbi Baeck—Leo Baeck—the chief rabbi of Berlin.”

  “What do rabbis know?” the woman continues. “It’s because of them and their religion we’re in this mess.”

  “What is it you want to tell us, Rabbi Baeck?” Frau Davidels asks, raising her voice.

  “Look up ahead,” he says. We all look at the mass of bodies milling in front of us. “Do you see the stars?”

  I look up at the sky, but the rabbi is wrong, there are no stars. Not one. Perhaps the stars witnessed what went on here tonight and decided not to shine.

  Other people look up. When Rabbi Baeck speaks again, his voice sounds less patient. “Not up in the sky. Ahead of you!”

  And suddenly I understand what Rabbi Baeck is talking about. Up ahead, extending all the way to the horizon are row after row of stars. Yellow ones—the stars we are forced to wear on our shirts and jackets.

  “The stars meant to humiliate us Jews provide illumination in the gloom. They’re a sign,” Rabbi Baeck says.

  “A sign of what?” the same woman who sounded so angry before asks.

  “A sign we mustn’t ever give up.”

  It is dawn when the Nazis finally let us leave the field. My eyelids ache from tiredness. When Theo stumbles, I stop to help him up. I’m too tired now to be angry with him.

  Frau Davidels and Mother hold each other by the arm. Now that our ordeal is over, I start to think more clearly. That’s when I realize I didn’t see Hannelore during the census count. I hope she and her mother are all right.

  When Frau Davidels yawns, I can see the gold crowns on her back teeth. Hannelore’s mother told her that when prisoners die in Theresienstadt and are cremated, other prisoners are forced to scour the ashes in search of gold fillings. The thought makes me shiver.

  A few strands of Frau Davidels’ dark hair are stuck to her cheek. “It’s nearly time to get to work,” she tells me when she catches me looking at her.

  “Work? Do you really think we’ll have to work after the night we’ve had?”

  Frau Davidels shakes her head. “It’s inhuman to make us work after such a night, and that’s precisely why they’ll make us do it.” She pats my shoulder. “Perhaps,” she adds, “you’ll have a chance to doze a little in your cauldron.”

  “Forty thousand.” People are repeating the number, which is how many prisoners have been counted during the night. We knew the camp was overcrowded. But forty thousand prisoners crammed into a city built to house seven thousand! No wonder there is so little space and so little water! And though no one says it, we all know what the results of the census mean: Soon there will be another transport.

  As Theo and I turn the corner onto Jagergasse, a woman with dark hair cranes her head to look at me. She holds a child in her arms, and another child, a little boy, is tugging on her long skirt. Why does the woman seem familiar? And then, all at once, I place her. It is Franticek’s girlfriend, the one with whom I’d seen him go into the cubbyhole. I want to turn away, but I can’t. I am too curious. How did she and her children manage during the census count? Where is her husband? And does she miss Franticek as much as I do?

  Perhaps it is my imagination, but I think I catch her eyeing my necklace. Franticek’s necklace.

  I raise one hand to my neck and let my fingers take hold of the worn leather. There. If she did not notice the necklace before, she will notice it now.

  Franticek touched this necklace. But then I realize with a start that he touched her too. I burn with jealousy. And then I remind myself what Franticek told me: that what he and this woman did together were “animal things.” Those were his very words. There was nothing animal about our feelings for each other. It was different for Franticek and me.

  To my surprise, the woman smiles at me. A small smile, but there is no question about it: she is smiling. I can’t bring myself to smile back. In spite of what I’ve tried to tell myself, I am still jealous. She knows Franticek in a way I never did, in a way that perhaps I never shall.

  When a few minutes later, Mother opens the door to our quarters and lets us in, I nearly weep. Not because I am sad. No, these are tears of joy. I am so relieved to be back in our miserable home. Eventually, every animal grows used to his cage.

  Nine

  An old woman said...”

  “Did you hear what the old woman said?”

  Theresienstadt is full of old women. Even the women who aren’t old—Mother, Frau Davidels and Hannelore’s mother—all look old. But when people discuss what an old woman has been saying, they aren’t talking about any one old woman. No. “An old woman said...” is camp code. It means there is news.

  So I prick up my ears one winter morning in 1944 when I hear two prisoners mention the old woman. There is a layer of hard-packed snow on the ground, and I am sipping coffee outside one of the kitchens near our quarters. Only it isn’t really coffee. It is what we call ersatz, or make-believe, coffee. It is made of chicory and has a mild grainy flavor. But like everyone else, I’ve long forgotten the taste of real coffee. This at least warms my fingers. I take small sips; bigger ones hurt my throat.

  As I look around I think how coffee isn’t all that is make-believe at Theresienstadt. The whole camp is make-believe. The stores are make-believe. The bank is make-believe. And sometimes, it seems to me, even our hope is make-believe. People continue to say the end of the war is coming soon, but when they speak, I have the feeling they are only pretending to be hopeful. Making believe for the good of young people like me, and also for themselves.

  So what does the old woman have to say?

  Commandant Rahm has met with the Council of Elders. The Nazis have decided to introduce a new program: the Embellishment. I am puzzled. Embellishment? There is nothing “belle” (I know the word “embellishment” comes from the French word for beauty) about this vile gray place. Perhaps Father will know more. He’s been back home with us for nearly a month. He still wobbles a little when he walks and when he comes home from the studio, I notice his fingers sometim
es tremble. But the main thing is, he is able to do his work, and he’s no longer on reduced rations.

  So that night, when we are pulling the bedbugs off our blankets, I ask Father about the Embellishment. I can tell from the way Mother shakes out Theo’s blanket that she and Father have already discussed the news.

  Father sits down on the edge of my mattress. “The Nazis are expecting important visitors—representatives from the Danish Red Cross. They want Theresienstadt to appear to be the model city they’ve boasted about.”

  “That’s crazy,” I say. “Some model city! It’s more like a model of misery, is what it is.”

  “There’s good news,” says Father. “Commandant Rahm has promised to make a number of improvements to the camp. We’re supposed to get a playground for the children.”

  “With swing sets and a carousel?” Theo interrupts.

  “I don’t know about the carousel,” Father says, “but it’s likely there will be swing sets.” When he smiles at Theo, Father’s eyes look very sad.

  “What else?” I ask Father.

  “There’s talk of flowerbeds and benches for prisoners to sit on.”

  I remember how I sipped my coffee standing up that morning. Benches will be nice. But then I consider how benches, flowerbeds and swing sets will do nothing to quell the hunger in our bellies. How ridiculous of the Nazis to spend money on frivolous things when everyone in Theresienstadt is starving!

  “What about food?” I ask Father. “Will we be getting bigger rations? Real meat in our soup?”

  “I haven’t heard anything about food,” Father admits.

  “Food is what we need most,” I tell him.

  “But this is a start,” he says.

  It bothers me that Father is trying so hard to look at the bright side of things. Why can’t he see that the Nazis are making a mockery of us?

  Mother folds Theo’s blanket over her arm. “I’m glad at least the Danish Red Cross cares about what’s happening to us here,” she says.

  Father nods. “The Danish Red Cross is asking questions because of the trainload of Danish Jews who arrived here last month. But it looks as if their visit may improve conditions for the rest of us.”

  “It’s not as if we can eat flowers,” I mutter.

  Then Theo, who rarely says anything that isn’t annoying or just plain silly, surprises us all. “What about the Dutch Red Cross?” he wants to know. “Why haven’t they come to visit?”

  Father and Mother exchange a look. “The boy makes a good point,” Father says.

  I sigh. For the first time, I feel as if I’ve been abandoned by my own country. How could Holland let this happen to us? All this talk of embellishment only makes me feel worse. “Embellishment?” I cry out. “It’s insane!”

  Am I the only one who realizes how twisted our lives have become? To think we are excited about swing sets and benches and flowerbeds! Have we forgotten how hungry we are—and how others, like Franticek, have been shipped off to God only knows where? This Embellishment is just one more way for the Nazis to distract us from the truth: that we are wasting away in this miserable sick place.

  Father breathes hard when he stands up. It’s another aftereffect of the diphtheria. “It’s true we can’t eat flowers, Anneke,” he says, “but we have to be practical. The Embellishment will mean more jobs for prisoners. And that buys us all something we desperately need.”

  “What’s that?” I ask.

  Father glances down at his left wrist. It’s where he used to wear the watch that was taken away from him in the Schleuse. “Time,” he says. “We’re in desperate need of time.”

  Within a week, there is a new sound in the camp: hammering. Tap, tap, tap-a-tap-tap. There is hammering everywhere. Near the main square, where Commandant Rahm has ordered the facades of more shops to be built, including a bonbonnerie. At the corner, where a café is being constructed—imagine, how preposterous: a café inside a prison!—and even outside our quarters, where a prisoner is installing a flowerbox made of rough-hewn planks.

  The incessant hammering gives me a headache. Still, I have to admit that despite all my objections, the various improvements to the camp are not entirely unpleasant.

  Even if it is all a sham, all part of a giant hoax, the improvements—and the work on the improvements— seems to be lifting people’s spirits. “Do you think they’ll send us geraniums for the flowerbox?” I hear Mother ask Father. “I so hope we’ll have red geraniums. Tulips would be too much to ask for, what with the bulbs, but geraniums, especially bright red ones, would do me a world of good.”

  And yet, listening to Mother go on about red flowers also makes me want to scream. Doesn’t she realize flowers won’t do us any real good? What we need is food! Real food, not watery lentil soup and moldy bread! What we need is a way out of this place and an end to this awful war!

  But there are moments when I, too, get caught up in plans for the Embellishment. I close my eyes and imagine myself and Hannelore at the café, listening to a concert. We’ve heard there will be weekly concerts for prisoners at the café.

  “Do you think we’ll have hot chocolate?” Theo asks, licking his cracked lips. And though I doubt it, I don’t have the heart to tell him so.

  Father is involved in the Embellishment too. He has been commissioned by Commandant Rahm himself to decorate the walls of the children’s infirmary. The commandant has requested, of all things, a fairy-tale motif. When one night, Father tells us about it, I laugh out loud. “Bah!” I say. “Fairy tales! A painting of a graveyard would be a better choice!”

  Father gives me a stern look. “Anneke,” he says, “remember what I told you.”

  Father has already completed one mural of Rapunzel with her long blond hair streaming out of the tower where she was imprisoned by a terrible witch.

  “Anneke’s right,” I hear Father tell Mother later when the curtain that separates us is drawn. “It is bizarre to be painting fairy-tale scenes in a place like this.” I’m glad that at least in private, Father shares my opinion.

  Mother makes a tut-tutting sound. “Perhaps your murals will bring the sick children a little joy.” How can Mother really believe the Embellishment has some value?

  Doesn’t she see the Nazis are trying to trick not only the Danish Red Cross, but us as well?

  Father sighs. “You may be right. Besides, Rapunzel is a hopeful story. She found a way out of her prison. I sometimes wonder, Tineke”—Father lowers his voice to a whisper—”whether we’ll ever find a way out.” My shoulders tense up. It isn’t like Father to sound so discouraged. How can he, of all people, be losing hope? The thought makes me feel unmoored.

  But then I hear Mother’s voice, soft and strong. “Jo,” she says, “you’ll always be my handsome prince.”

  “I was just a frog until you kissed me.”

  Mother laughs. “Now, Jo, you’re mixing up your fairy-tales.”

  I hear them shift a little on their mattress.

  I have so many worries on my mind: Franticek, this crazy Embellishment and my sense that I am the only one who understands we are being duped. Yet the sound of Mother’s laughter stays with me as I drift off to sleep.

  “Your father is working too hard on those murals,” Mother tells me one afternoon soon after that. She twists some strands of dark hair around her index finger. “I worry about him.”

  I reach into my apron pocket and take out the potato Frau Davidels has just given me. It is small and misshapen, but I know Mother will be pleased. “I’m going to boil it up straightaway,” she says, glad, as usual, to have some task to keep her occupied. “Then you can deliver it to the children’s infirmary.”

  Father is standing on a chair, using a thick pencil to draw a giant frog on the wall across from the doctors’ station. He is concentrating so hard on getting the warts on the frog’s back right, he doesn’t notice me coming down the hallway.

  “Father!” I call out, looking around to see no one is in earshot. “Mother asked me to
deliver this.” She has packed three thin slices of boiled potato inside her enamel cup. Theo and I have already eaten our share. Mother didn’t want any. “I’m not hungry,” she said when she sliced the potato. Of course, I know it isn’t true.

  Father’s face brightens. My stomach rumbles as I watch him pop the first slice into his mouth. I am so hungry it hurts. “You take this one,” he says, offering me the second slice.

  I remember how Mother said she was worried about Father. “I’ve already had my share,” I tell him, looking away.

  On my way out, I see two doctors. I know they are Jewish because I’ve seen them in the soup line with the rest of us. They are outside one of the small rooms they use to perform operations. “Now that we’ve set the bone, the child will likely walk without a limp,” one of the doctors says to the other.

  I smile as I pass them. I want them to know I am grateful for everything they do. It’s a blessing the child they’re discussing won’t have a limp.

  They are standing in front of the Rapunzel mural. Rapunzel’s hair looks so thick and blond I can practically feel its coarse texture. I have an urge to tell them my father painted her, but I am too shy. Just then, the younger of the two turns toward the mural, looking at it as if he is noticing it for the first time. “Part of the Embellishment,” he says, rolling his eyes. “Designed so that when the Danish Red Cross visits, its representatives will be impressed by the looks of our fine infirmary.”

  My urge to tell them that the mural is my father’s work disappears. So I am not the only one who disapproves of the Embellishment. Why else would this doctor roll his eyes?

  “We’re living in an insane world,” his colleague observes.

  I suck in my breath. I’m right, then, to be suspicious of the Embellishment. These men are doctors, scientists; they must know the truth.

  “What’s most insane isn’t this new wall decoration,” the first doctor says. “What’s most insane is that the Nazis ask us to treat children, only to dispose of them in the death camps.”