by Ben Elton
Then Frieda would ring the little ‘no moaning’ bell that she kept beside her and insist, ‘We must stop this! And if we can’t stop it we must at least be civil about it. We’re all starting to bicker and snap at each other. It’s hardly surprising, all cooped up together as we are, but that’s all the more reason to try harder to show each other respect.’
Try as she might, though, it was not possible for Frieda to steer the conversation away from endless discussions about the rapidly deteriorating situation in general.
The truth was there was really little else to talk about.
The register of Jewish assets in April had been a huge psychological blow, and even Frieda herself could not help dwelling on the cruelty of the action.
‘It’s like a note through the door saying, We’re coming to get you,’ she said. ‘Or a thug on the other side of the street just standing, watching you with a smile on his face, whacking his cosh into the palm of his hand. It’s really quite brilliant. Making us list our things and then letting it hang over us. If they ever make bullying an Olympic sport, then Germany will win Gold in Tokyo in 1940.’
‘Ja, es ist absolut erschreckend …’ Morgenstern the ex-book dealer agreed in frustration.
‘In English, please, Mr Morgenstern,’ Frieda said. ‘This is an English conversation group.’
‘Yes. Of course,’ the old man stammered, searching in his mind for the correct words. ‘It is so very terrified, nicht wahr? I mean, is it not?’
‘Terrifying,’ Frieda corrected, ‘not terrified. You are terrified because it is terrifying.’
In June the conversation group lost a member when the government announced that any Jew previously convicted of an offence, even as minor as a traffic violation, could be rearrested for it at the discretion of the police and sent to a concentration camp.
Schmulewitz the ex-insurance broker fell immediate victim to this new decree.
‘He was done for drunk driving in 1925,’ his tearful wife explained, bravely struggling to deliver her dreadful news in English as the rules of the group required. ‘A local policeman Hans once challenged over insurance is now having his revenge, and Hans has been sent to Ravensbrück. For a glass of schnapps he was fined for in 1925!’
In July came news that was particularly demeaning for Frieda.
‘I have to tell you all,’ she told the group, in perfect English, ‘that officially at least you must not call me “doctor”. The medical certification for all Jewish doctors is to be cancelled. I am no longer qualified. They’re only going to let us function as nurses and even then, of course, only to Jewish patients.’
‘So haben sie endlich einen Weg gefunden …’
‘In English please, Mrs Leibovitz,’ Frieda interrupted. ‘Always in English.’
‘I was saying,’ Frau Leibovitz corrected herself, ‘that they’ve finally found a way to redress the so-called “imbalance” regarding Jewish doctors that used to worry them so much. We used to be told we had too many doctors, now we don’t have any.’
In August came the shocking decree that all Jews were required to add the names ‘Israel’ or ‘Sara’ to their own names and that a large letter J was to be stamped on to every Jewish passport.
‘They’re marking us down,’ Herr Katz said. ‘Identifying every single one of us so we can’t hide. Why? What are they planning? What more can they do to us?’
Frieda almost smiled. What more can they do to us? Each of them said it. To themselves and to each other, over and over again. Whoever could have imagined that such a phrase would be the most common English sentence used in her conversation group?
‘Ah ah, Herr Katz,’ she admonished gently. ‘You know that I have banned that phrase as overused. Try to come up with an alternative construction.’
‘Very well then, Mrs Doctor,’ Katz said, his brow furrowed in concentration. ‘How about – the end, where will all of it be coming?’
‘Not bad,’ Frieda said. ‘The correct English sentence would be: Where will it all end?’
The Night of the Broken Glass
Berlin, November 1938
OTTO WAS AWOKEN by the familiar harsh rasping bark of a command delivered as unpleasantly and as aggressively as the speaker knew how.
‘Jungmannen! Parade, you lazy swine!’
Otto looked at his wristwatch. It was nearly midnight.
Of course it was.
Midnight. The Nazis’ favourite hour.
Everything felt more special at midnight, more sternly historic. Swearing-ins, oaths of allegiance, flag ceremonies. Brutal initiations and impossibly tough physical tasks. Why do them after breakfast when you can do them in the middle of the night? With bonfires, flickering torches and muffled drums?
Otto rolled out of his bunk. He had been asleep and lost in dreams of Dagmar from which he was most annoyed to have been torn.
‘Turn out, you fucking swine,’ the voice commanded. ‘On parade! Civilian clothes.’
Otto’s heart sank. It seemed to him that the dorm leaders had in mind their favourite torture. This was to force the boys on and off parade in all of their various kits in turn, summer, winter, sport, formal, swim, labouring etc., with ever decreasing periods of time in which to make the changes. Then when every single item of clothing and equipment in the school had been thrown on and thrown off in a frenzy of impossible deadlines, the leaders would call a dormitory inspection and punish the whole school for slovenly kept kit.
Otto’s options on civilian dress were more limited than the other boys’. He was an orphan without personal means, supported by the state. The school board supplied him with everything he possessed, and while Otto’s uniforms were splendid, they were not lavish with anything else. Otto had no long trousers to put on and so despite it being November he had to turn out on the frosty parade ground in shorts, which caused much sniggering amongst the younger boys.
Otto was just noting the identities of these juveniles for later payback, and also wondering why they had not already been sent running back to their dorms to change into another kit, when the headmaster himself emerged on to the parade ground in full party uniform.
‘Jungmannen!’ the principal began as every boy in the school stamped to attention in perfect unison. The man’s face was aglow with excitement and it was clear to Otto that whatever was coming was to be no mundane dormitory punishment exercise. ‘Tonight we are to be given the honour of acting alongside our party comrades in the SS!’
A shiver of excitement ran amongst the boys. The SS were heroes, Black Knights, the Death’s Head Gang. At Napola schools they represented the ultimate glamour, far more so than the Wehrmacht. Otto, however, felt a grip of fear. Even though he had become somewhat immersed in school life now and in fact enjoyed its rigorous physical challenges, he never forgot who his enemy was. Or who his family was and, most of all, whom he loved. He always knew that by the very nature of being a Napola boy he would at some point be called upon to act against his own kind.
He also knew that he would never do that.
Even at the risk of discovery and punishment, even of death.
‘We are also, by the way,’ the principal continued with a beaming smile, ‘to have a little fun. Because, my brave young German heroes, the time has come to settle one or two scores with those gentlemen and ladies who would do us harm. Tonight, lads, we have an appointment with the race enemy! With Germany’s misfortune! With the Jew!’
While the other boys grinned and discreetly nudged each other, Otto swallowed hard and tried to concentrate. The atmosphere in the city had been tense for days. There had been a murder in Paris. A Jew had shot a German embassy man and there had been plenty of talk of revenge both in the papers and on the street. Could this be the moment?
Standing rigidly to attention, Otto listened intently, staring at the principal through the cloud of silver breath that hung in front of his face.
Then he noticed something else.
The sky towards the city was glowing red.
How could that be? The sun had set hours ago.
Otto felt his stomach turn. Nausea gripped at his gut and his bowel. Something very wrong was hanging in the cold night air.
‘You will be aware, of course,’ the principal continued, his voice harsh, like metal on stone, ‘of the outrage that has occurred recently in Paris. A Jew has committed the vilest of murders. A crime against Germany, and tonight that Jew’s cousins here in Germany will pay! All over the Reich spontaneous demonstrations of outrage and retribution are breaking out. You, my young men, are to have the honour of being a part of this great reckoning alongside the entire Schutzstaffel and Sturmabteilung. Think of it, boys! The SS and the SA – and you are to be their comrades in combat! Be it noted, however, that they have also been instructed to operate out of uniform. The reason for this is that no maggot from the foreign press may accuse these demonstrations of being anything other than popular and spontaneous. For they are spontaneous, you can be assured of that, lads! But spontaneity as we understand the word in National Socialist Germany! Spontaneity that is properly and correctly ordered in the service of the state!’
Otto was hardly listening. He was watching the sky. It was getting redder.
Berlin was burning.
Or at least parts of it were, and there could be no doubt which parts they were.
The urge to break ranks and run, to get to Dagmar as fast as possible, thundered in Otto’s brain and pounded in his heart. He thought of his mother, too, but she at least had Paulus. Dagmar had no one to protect her at all. Otto struggled to remain at attention, he knew that to be of any use to her he must not panic, he must focus. He could see that trucks had been lined up at the end of the parade ground. Clearly he and the other boys were to be taken somewhere. It could only be into the heart of the ‘action’. If he wanted to get to Dagmar, for the moment at least he was better off remaining with the school.
‘These demonstrations of popular outrage are taking place across the entire Reich!’ the principal went on. ‘In every village, town and city. Wherever a Jew nest is found it is to be attacked. Our particular task is to pay a visit to the Kurfürstendamm! We are to make it clear to the whole world what Germany’s youth feels about the fact that Jew Communist Capitalist Parasites still fester and breed in the heart of our city! The SS have asked only for our older boys to assist in this action but I have decided on my own authority to send the whole school. For Germany is its youth and none are too young to serve. And as the Führer has said many times, youth must lead!’
Otto looked across the parade ground to the youngest of the pupils. Eleven-year-olds all turned out in their scarves and mufflers and their plus-four trousers. All standing rigidly to attention on the glittering frosty parade ground. Clouds of breath hanging in the air in front of them, yellow in the lamplight. The billowing swastika banners fluttering in the breeze above them.
Some of the little boys looked nervous, scared almost. But most were grinning broadly. It wasn’t every night that they were woken up and ordered by their teachers to go and smash windows.
Otto began almost to shake with frustration. When would they board the trucks? When would the old bastard shut up and let them go?
‘These orders,’ the principal went on, ‘have come from SS-Obergruppenführer Heydrich himself, and they are to be followed with absolute discipline as befits Napola boys. All Jews, Jewish businesses, Jewish property and Jewish dwellings are to be attacked, and all synagogues, without exception, are to be destroyed. However, no foreigners are to be threatened and this is to include foreign Jews. Where fires are set, extreme care must be taken that no German property is damaged in the action. If in doubt, smash but don’t burn. Am I clear? Gentlemen! The school maintenance department have supplied what hammers, sledge hammers, crowbars and spades are available. These are to be taken by the older boys. Signed for and returned!’
On command, the boys of Otto’s class rushed to grab at the best weapons, but Otto held back. He did not wish to be encumbered by school property for which he would have to answer, and he had no intention of remaining on the Kurfürstendamm. Dagmar would certainly not be there in the middle of the night.
Dwellings, the principal had said. They were to attack dwellings and Otto could imagine that the richer the dwelling, the more gleeful would be the attack. The well-identified Fischer house was an obvious target.
The boys boarded their buses and there was much raucous singing as they drove through the darkness towards the city.
All the old schoolroom favourites.
The Jews’ blood spurting from the knife makes us feel especially good.
Otto tried to join in, knowing that he must not arouse suspicion, but it was difficult for him to focus on the boisterous camaraderie. With each kilometre that passed, the scenes in the streets through which they were being driven grew uglier and more terrifying.
Every street contained at least one shop that had been smashed and set alight. Houses and apartment blocks were being wrecked, too, surrounded by wild mobs.
Pressing his face to the window, Otto saw many beatings. On every corner young men were being kicked on the ground. Girls thrown about by their hair and pushed into gutters. Mothers kicked and punched as they were dragged from their homes, babies screaming in their arms.
The air was very cold outside and with so many lusty voices singing inside the coach the windows were dripping with condensation. To see out, Otto had constantly to wipe a fresh gap in the wet film, and through this cloudy porthole a monstrous tableau of images was revealed.
He saw a man shot and another knifed.
Uniformed police were at the very heart of the disturbances. Over and over Otto watched as terrified young men were thrown into police vans, baton blows raining down on their defenceless heads.
Berlin’s Jews did not live in a ghetto, they were an integrated part of city life, and so the whole town bore witness to the savage, hysterical attacks.
It was an apocalyptic scene.
A pogrom of unrestrained brutality.
Now the Napola coaches were crossing the river Spree, driving over the Moltke bridge, the very place from which Wolfgang had thrown himself the year before. Otto gave that tragedy only a moment’s thought. A brief image of his father, putting his trumpet to his lips and then jumping from the parapet, passed across Otto’s mind but then it was gone. The terror of the immediate blotting out all pity for the past.
Once over the river and through the Tiergarten, although still some way short of the Ku’damm, the school buses were forced to stop. The streets were now so littered with shards of broken glass that the drivers feared their tyres would be shredded. The boys were therefore assembled on the pavement and ordered to make their way on foot to the famous shopping street, and once there to attack anything Jewish at will.
At this point it was a simple thing for Otto to slip away.
They wouldn’t miss him, it was chaos everywhere. The Napola group would never be able to stick together in such a frenzied crowd and he would not be the only straggler.
But Otto didn’t care anyway; he was in a panic to get to Dagmar.
The glass crunched horribly beneath his feet as he ran, pushing his way through the baying, staggering, swaggering gangs of men and women, intoxicated on stolen booze and on power.
Absolute power.
It seemed to Otto as if the whole population was out on the streets, although of course he knew they weren’t. No doubt the majority of Berliners were cowering, ostrich-like, behind their curtains. But there were enough people enjoying the party to make it look like the whole city, every thug, every thief, every bully, every disaffected inadequate with a grievance was on the rampage.
Many times Otto wanted to stop and try to help as pitifully defenceless people fell victim to the depraved savagery of the mob. A mob who had been whipped up into a storm of moral outrage against the ‘crimes’ of the race enemy.
These people deserved what they were getting.
Their attackers were actually the victims.
Forced to act having been goaded beyond endurance.
Torchlight flickered on faces that had become grotesque masks, distorted and bloated with righteous cruelty and untrammelled sadism.
Torch beams crisscrossed streets, searching for loot, for victims. For scurrying children to kick.
In every street Otto saw homes ransacked. He saw clothes torn from young women by mobs who chanted that they were whores. He saw five-and six-year-olds, their mouths so wide with screaming that their entire faces seemed nothing but great black wailing holes.
And other children silent, twitching, staring, dead-eyed and traumatized as their mothers and fathers were beaten in front of them. Killed in front of them.
Otto could not help them.
He scarcely registered them; they passed before his eyes like the disjointed imagery of a nightmare.
A dream.
Just two hours earlier he had been dreaming of Dagmar. Where was she? Was she already suffering at the hands of the mob? Were they pulling at her clothes? Were they beating her? Murdering her?
Desperate fear sent blood pumping through Otto’s body and he ran as he had never run before. Past the old Kaiser’s memorial church, along the Kantstrasse, where mobs of youths were starting bonfires of the Jewish property they did not wish to steal.
The contents of entire shops. Clothes, hardware, office supplies. Otto saw crazed women slashing at shop mannequins with knives. He saw men smashing typewriters and adding machines with sledge hammers. Entire telephone exchange boards torn from walls, hurled out of windows and reduced to splinters.
Snarling shouts and hoarse cries rang in Otto’s ears as he ran.
Berlin’s synagogues were burning, came the shout. The looted treasures of the temples lay scattered before Otto as he ran. Ground underfoot, hurled on to bonfires. Great and venerable leather-bound tomes fluttering like multi-winged moths on their way to incineration. Paintings, statues, carved lecterns, wall hangings and ornate furniture, all food for the flames.
Otto passed a gang of youths dancing about in stolen prayer shawls. They had made a patchwork on the pavement of some sacred embroideries and were forcing elderly Jews to urinate on them while their grey-haired wives stood by and wept.