by Mick Hare
It was at the moment when she said, “I think I’ll go up to bed now,” that Sean felt another person take control. He got up too and said simply, “Me too.”
Lily turned at the door. Her face held a mixture of surprise and triumph. When Sean reached her they embraced immediately like lovers. There was no preparatory exploration. Her lips sought his and her tongue darted into his mouth. A thousand walls came crashing down inside Sean. He returned the pressure of her body against his and before he knew it he had her skirt up above her waist and his hands were caressing the whites of her thighs above her stockings. She placed her hands upon his shoulders to gently restrain him and whispered into his ear, “Not here, come with me.”
Sean followed her up to her room, his mind a wild tornado of imagery. Martha was there, flashing in and out of his thoughts, and her presence made the passion for Lily all the more erotic. Grete was there too. He was ashamed and the shame made his desire more powerful still. As he followed Lily to her room he could not keep his hands from her. By the time she had drawn the curtains they were unable to control themselves even long enough to undress. She pulled his belt free as he raised her skirt and pulled her panties aside. She lay on the bed as he rubbed her triangle, but she stopped him as he attempted to enter her with his fingers. She pulled him onto her and guided him inside. The dark, wet heat made him groan uninhibitedly. As he penetrated her he lifted her blouse over her head and removed her bra, exposing her full breasts. He kissed the proud, upright nipples before she rolled him over to be on top. Drawing her legs up either side of his trunk she rode him like a girl on a pony. His big hands roamed over her back, her breasts, her buttocks. He reached up and caressed her cheeks. He drew her down to kiss her lips and he whispered, “I must come out. I am ready to finish.”
“No!” she screamed as she rode him harder. “You must come. You must come!”
“But we’re not protected,” Sean said breathlessly.
She leaned down, her wide mouth on his face, her vagina parting wider to take him further in. “It’s all right,” she moaned, “It’s my fifth day.”
As the words entered his consciousness, Sean fell off a cliff. His mind roared with the image of the forbidden and the unclean and the contradiction of the purity of love. And in the drowsy aftermath Sean opened his soul to Lily and cried his heart out in her naked embrace. Lily cried too to hear of the terrible tragedy that had stricken the Colquhoun family and washed this man up here preparing to wage a one man war against Nazi Germany.
Sixteen
1933
Sean and Max were in the theatre prep room where they were scrubbing up prior to a day’s programme of operations they were to assist in. Fuchs, as senior consultant, rarely dirtied his hands in actual surgery, but today he was leading one of his occasional bursts of activity. Raul would be supporting too and Sean was looking forward to working alongside him for once.
When Sean had first read through the day’s list he had been surprised that Fuchs was going to lead. There was no one special on the list and it had not taken Sean long to realise that Fuchs generally only became directly involved when someone he considered to be important was to be treated. It was in fact a pretty mundane selection of operations; three caesarean sections, two gallstones, three stomach ulcers and two appendectomies. The only thing unusual about the list was that all patients were female, but that could just be chance.
“Good morning gentlemen,” chimed Fuchs in an upbeat manner as he entered the prep room. He joined them at the basins and began his own preparation. Raul came in just then, but before he could join them at the basins Fuchs said, “Ah, Hildberg. I noticed blood on the floor of the theatre just now. Go in and clean it before we start!”
Sean could not believe what he was hearing. Raul was a senior surgeon. It was not his role to clean the theatre floor.
“I beg your pardon,” Raul stammered.
Fuchs straightened himself up and turned to stare at Raul. Sean felt the intimidation in the stare.
“Which part of my instruction did you not understand Hildberg?”
“I understood the instruction, Sir,” began Raul in reply, “It’s just…”
“Well get on with it then and stop wasting this hospital’s precious time!”
Raul turned and went through to the theatre. Hurrying to finish his own preparations, Sean followed him through.
“Here,” he said, “I’ll give you a hand.”
Raul looked up from his position on the floor, scrubbing brush in hand and smiled at Sean.
“No,” he said decisively. “You’ve already scrubbed up. You’ll have to do it all over again if you help me. Anyway, that’s the last of it gone now. I’ll go and scrub up myself.”
The nature of the day’s activities was revealed during the course of the first operation. The first patient was one Lisa Brauer; 25 years old, Jewish, married, no children. Reason for operation – appendectomy.
The operation was straightforward and Sean was very impressed with the skill and efficiency of Fuchs’ work. He dropped the appendix into the receptacle and the theatre nurse wiped sweat from his forehead.
“Shall I finish off?” Max enquired, thinking to give Fuchs a breather before starting the next procedure.
“No thank you Max. I wish to move on to the second part of the procedure for this patient.”
“Oh,” replied Max. “My apologies. When I read the notes I only saw appendectomy specified.”
“Don’t worry about it,” replied Fuchs and Sean thought he had never seen him in such good humour before.
He began his incision as he spoke. “I will now effect a hysterectomy. This patient is a classic example of the undesirable elements within our society which it is our great task to control. The new government under the Fuhrer will regenerate the health of the volk with careful policies that ensure the reproduction of only the racially hygienic and healthy of our race.”
With stunned silence Sean, Max and Raul watched as Fuchs removed the patient’s womb. As the nurse turned away with the debris to dispose of it she stopped and said, “Pardon me, Herr Fuchs. There was a foetus present.”
“Thank you nurse,” Fuchs replied. “Not a moment too soon, hey, gentlemen.” And he walked through to the preparation room to ready himself for the next procedure.
Nine more operations; nine more hysterectomies. With each one Sean felt more sickened until, by the end, he felt damned by association. With each cut of the knife Fuchs would explain the need for the procedure with a word or two about each patient.
“Asocial.”
“Gypsy.”
“Criminal alcoholic.”
“Jew.”
“Asocial.”
“Prostitute.”
“Jew.”
“Asocial.”
“Asocial.”
At the end of the day Max, Sean and Raul left the hospital together and walked across Volkspark Friedrichshain to a coffee bar on the east side. None of them felt like coffee. They all ordered beer.
“Well,” ventured Raul. “There are three babies who will never play around the fountains in the Volkspark.”
In total three of the women had turned out to be pregnant and been the recipients of involuntary abortions in tandem with their involuntary sterilisation. The three men drank in silence, each finding it as hard as the others to put their experiences into words. Eventually Sean found something to say.
“If we were in Ireland we would go to prison for this day’s work.”
The other two men looked at him. Max was the first to respond.
“Thank God we’re not in Ireland then is all I can say. Germany is very different to Ireland as I am sure you know Sean. We have pretensions to modernity. We look to science to guide our policies. And, let us not forget, today we have a National Socialist government.”
“Today we assisted a butcher in carrying out crimes against humanity,” interjected Raul in a depressed, resigned tone.
Sean looked at him, waiti
ng for him to continue but Max responded swiftly curtailing any development by Raul of his point.
“Oh come on, Raul. Let’s not get too melodramatic. This country has been developing a policy of eugenics for several decades. And we’re not the only ones. Eugenics is a feature of the social policy of most Scandinavian countries and much more developed than here in Germany. Parts of America are well ahead of us in this field.”
“If you don’t mind me asking,” interrupted Sean, “What is the aim of this eugenics policy?”
Max took a deep drink. He looked in two minds as to whether to attempt an answer, being only too aware of where the conversation might lead. But, looking from Sean to Raul and back again, he plunged on.
“Eugenics is about the health of the volk. Many scientific studies have been carried out investigating the worthiness of certain types within the volk. Some families have been tracked back as far as the seventeen hundreds. These so-called “asocial” families are shown to have traits that lead to criminality, work-shyness, prostitution, dishonesty, mental illness, you name it. These traits recur in all branches of the families in all generations. The eugenics standpoint is that these weaken the blood of the nation. Ironically, they breed more prolifically than other sectors of society, more healthy sectors, and therefore their blood is spread ever more widely throughout the volk. When their children go to school they are slow learners and they disrupt classes. As adults they create large mismanaged and dysfunctional families. They are a drain on the state. Their high reproductive rate weakens the blood stock of the volk. A eugenics programme would improve the blood stock by first encouraging more stable, respectable sectors of society to increase their rate of reproduction and to gradually eradicate the “asocials” or “undesirables” through a policy of sterilisation. That is what we saw in action today – a sterilisation programme.”
Raul leaned forward and in a quiet voice asked, “Max, will you tell me how Lisa Brauer was dysfunctional or asocial? According to her notes she was a recent graduate of Berlin University. She achieved first class qualifications in Physics. She is married to a young man who is a qualified veterinarian and she was expecting her first baby. She lived with her husband in a good area and she paid her taxes and rent without fail.”
Max looked crestfallen knowing that the only truthful answer he could give would be highly provocative. Nevertheless, he knew he could not duck the question or the answer.
“She was Jewish, Raul, that makes her an undesirable. You know that.”
A couple at the next table and a group of young men just beyond them turned to look at the three men who were inadvertently raising their voices. There was a long silence at their table as they sipped occasionally from their pots. But both Sean and Max knew that there was more brewing within Raul. Just as Sean thought he would break this hideous spell by calling for more drinks Raul spoke, “So this is where we are at, is it? Our Germanness is no longer good enough? The men I fought alongside in the Great War were German enough, but not me? Are you telling me Max, that the great and good German public are going to buy this anti-Semite message from their new Chancellor? Are you going to stand by and watch as we are - what was the word you used? Eradicated, from the blood stock?”
The table of young men again stopped to turn and observe the doctors in debate.
“ No,” protested Max. “Of course not. You must not get paranoid Raul. There have always been these theories and there have always been those more inclined to try them out. We are just unlucky that our Senior Consultant is a fanatical Nazi. But they will never become mainstream because the people wouldn’t stand for it.”
“Who will stop them?” asked Sean.
“What do you mean?” asked Max in return.
“I mean, who will stop them? Where is the political power to stop them?”
“My dear Sean,” replied Max. “You do have such a naïve view of German politics. Hitler will be a nine-day wonder. Hindenberg will keep him as a pet poodle on a tight leash for a few months at best, and then we will have a new centre right government and all of this turmoil will fade.”
“I might be naïve, ignorant even, but are you sure you know where this centre right group will come from?”
“Well for one thing,” replied Max, “There’s the Catholic Centre Party. It is massive and has almost complete support from Germany’s Catholics.”
“And where does the Catholic Centre Party stand on this notion of the eugenicists that sterilisation and abortion are good for the bloodline?”
Max was hesitant. “Well, it’s not so easy for them. They have to look to the Vatican for many of their policies.”
“Yes,” said Sean triumphantly, “And that’s the whole problem isn’t it. We all know the Vatican has been negotiating with Hitler and his chums for years. The powers that be in the Vatican don’t care what a state gets up to so long as they keep their schools, their churches and their financial grants.”
Raul, who had been silent throughout this exchange, called the waiter for more drinks. He turned in his chair as the waiter walked by ignoring his request. His face flushed angrily and he began to rise from his chair. Sean put a hand on his arm and restrained him.
“Leave it Raul,” he advised. “It’s not important right now.”
Max raised his hand to attract the waiter and he came over immediately.
When the drinks had been served Raul spoke, “I can feel myself separating in two. My Jewishness and my Germanness are splitting apart. The life, the fatherland, the friends, the places I have been attached to since birth, they all seem alien to me now. I don’t know what to do.”
Sean felt helpless. He was impressed with Max, who seemed to have a better understanding of how Raul was feeling and did his best to console him.
“Raul, listen to me,” he said. “This is all transitory. You must not let them force you into behaving in a way that is not natural to you. You must keep your self confidence. You must keep your pride and esteem intact. If you do not they will have won. They will have made you into what they say you are. You cannot allow that to happen.”
Almost simultaneously the three men realised that their light was being blocked by the four young men who had been sitting nearby. As one, they looked up at the intruders.
For the first time Sean noticed that they were wearing armbands on their shirtsleeves carrying the insignia of the Friekorps. The one who stood nearest the table fixed his gaze on Max and said, “There is a very noisy Jew on this table. Why do you spend time with him? I assume you are a good German, but I will begin to doubt that if I think you befriend noisy Jews.”
Instinctively Sean was on his feet. He was a good four inches taller than the stranger and he looked down into his face.
“You are interrupting a private conversation,” said Sean quietly, his face in close proximity to the other. “My recommendation to you is that you return to your table.”
There was a moment’s hesitation and Sean realised that the Friekorps thug was doing a rapid calculation about Sean, Max and Raul and what odds they presented to him and his comrades in a fight. That hesitation was enough to give Sean the ascendancy. In one swift move he took the thug’s shoulders and spun him around. With a push and a kick he propelled him into his comrades. In a moment Max and Raul were standing beside Sean. The Friekorps group were taken aback, and having lost the initiative decided to vacate the scene. As they headed for the door the spokesman turned and looked at Sean, “We’ll be back,” he threatened. And then he looked at Raul. “As for you – your days are numbered.” With that they left.
Re-seated at their table, the three doctors now felt uncomfortable. They felt under a microscope, being stared at by all the other customers. Max drained his pot and said, “Well, I must be going. I’ll see you boys in the morning. Good evening, Sean. Good evening Raul.”