by Glenn Bryant
Catharina sensed panic in her husband’s voice. He hated letting Michael down. She did not really know why. What did he feel he owed these people?
‘Five minutes,’ she shouted back downstairs.
Catharina sat at her mirror and looked at her make-up. She checked her hair and she checked the necklace she was wearing delicately around her neck. She was putting off going.
‘It’s now or never,’ she said to herself, rising from her seat and collecting a shawl for warmth from the end of their double bed.
Gerhard was stood waiting for her at the bottom of the stairs. He had already had a drink.
Catharina could smell it on him, but more than that. She could feel it in his manner. She would forgive him for drinking excessively tonight. She frankly did not care if he made a fool of himself. Do your worst, she thought.
Gerhard was already in the driver’s seat of their car when Catharina closed and locked the front door behind her. It was dark and cold and she felt naked in the night air. She could already feel Michael’s unsolicited eyes admiring her shape. She tried to put it to the back of her mind and pulled the shawl protectively around her shoulders and chest. Dashing quickly in her best heels to the car, she opened the door and climbed in. Gerhard immediately ignited the engine and pulled out of their driveway, heading into the city.
* * *
‘Catharina, Gerhard,’ beamed Michael in the majestic ballroom hosting tonight’s dinner.
Everyone was enjoying a drink, champagne exclusively, served by waiters and waitresses, before being called for dinner. Catharina and Gerhard were placed on a table for eight with Michael and five people they did not know.
‘How are you both? Lovely to see you. Catharina, you are a vision. You have outdone yourself this evening.’
Catharina struggled to smile in return.
Michael found her extremely desirable, lusting from a distance after her delicate feet, slim legs and, despite her years, toned hips. Gerhard was oblivious to the tacit friction between his wife and the man who had given them their son. Michael was not about to miss the opportunity to kiss Catharina generously on both cheeks. He slipped his hands a little too low around Catharina’s waist while doing so. Gerhard’s focus was elsewhere – on where his next drink was coming from.
He spied a waitress and intercepted her. The waitress watched Gerhard approach before meeting him halfway with three glasses of champagne on her tray. Michael already had a glass and had declined another so soon. Gerhard was tempted to grab both of the other glasses greedily for himself after first handing one politely to Catharina, but even he drew the line at that, although perhaps he would have, he thought, if Michael had not been so close.
The ballroom was a loud hum of people and chatter and ceremony. Grand chandeliers hung decadently overhead and Gerhard felt uncomfortable – he needed more liquor – and above his station in such company. He had always had an acute sense of his own low social standing and hated moving much above or below that status. Catharina did not care for her surroundings this evening either. She could only think of Janus and the intimacy they had shared in the café.
Michael was thriving. He feasted on occasions like tonight. It made him feel privileged, important, a man to look out for and to talk about admiringly out of earshot. Michael’s ego thrilled in the knowledge that people talked about him after he had left the room and had moved on to regale a neighbouring soiree. He daydreamed about it constantly. He had done so his whole life.
‘I’ll see you both at the table. Dinner will be called in ten minutes. There is a table plan over there,’ he said, motioning to a large, white sheet on the wall near a long bar, which stood empty.
‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ announced a grand voice and this evening’s master of ceremony. ‘Dinner will now be served. If you would like to make your way through to the dining hall, please.’
The sooner tonight is over, the better, thought Catharina, bracing herself.
Michael held out Catharina’s chair when she and Gerhard reached their table in the impressive dining hall. There were two other places free on the large but busy round table.
‘Danke, Michael,’ Catharina said politely.
There were smiles from other faces sat anonymously around. Catharina could hardly stand Michael’s nauseous show of servitude. She noticed no one else sympathised and she felt alone. Gerhard began pouring people wine happily from bottles left unopened on the table. She could see he was mildly drunk already. He would say more to these people tonight than he had to her in a month.
‘Gerhard, Catharina,’ said Michael, who had naturally taken it upon himself to host the table. ‘This is Herr Tomas Klinker and his good wife Frau Katherine Klinker.’
‘How do you do?’ said Catharina.
‘And this is Herr Johan Strudell.’
‘Delighted, Frau Diederich,’ said Johan, rising to his feet and delicately taking Catharina’s right hand in his own and kissing the top of it.
Catharina felt like it was 1859 not 1959 and was even more out of place.
‘How do you do, Herr Strudell?’ she said, maintaining etiquette.
Michael was in heaven over dinner. He seduced the ladies and he entertained the gents. He seemed at first glance like a man for everyone, but Catharina knew who he really was. The conversation for a moment at their table was led by others, Michael quietly asked Catharina, ‘How is your steak this evening?’
‘Lovely.’
‘Better than the meat you buy in town?’
‘The meat is beautiful this evening,’ said Catharina, lying.
She liked her steak pink but this was bloody and starting to make her senses turn. Gerhard was sat next to Catharina but out of immediate earshot. He was drunk and had his back turned, clumsily regaling other guests at their table. Their volume had momentarily increased through laughter. Michael seized upon the chance.
‘I see you are particularly fond of your butcher on Georg-Elser-Platz. How could tonight compare,’ he paused, searching, relishing the right words. ‘To that personal touch?’
Michael pulled himself away from Catharina’s side and began smiling falsely again at the other guests at their table.
Catharina froze and her skin flushed hot. She struggled to breathe. She instinctively wanted to flee the scene, but felt trapped by this predator poised so close.
‘Are you okay, darling?’ said Gerhard, oblivious to the discreet exchange which had just shaken his wife.
‘Yes, yes, fine,’ said Catharina, hurriedly trying to deflect attention from herself. She felt everyone at the table was staring. ‘I’m just going to use the restroom quickly. Excuse me.’
All the gents rose in archaic unison. Michael held his thick white napkin to his mouth, dabbing at traces of gravy around his lips which were not there. He was smiling.
Catharina rushed away and people assumed she was going to be sick, perhaps having childishly enjoyed rather too much champagne this evening. Her head was reeling. She felt the giant dining hall was on the Bismarck and had just struck an iceberg. Her world lurched, tipped on its side. Walking straight proved difficult. Her mind raced, and she could not collect her thoughts, strewn pitifully on the floor. What did Michael mean? What did he mean? How could he know? He could not possibly know. She had been so careful. Catharina thought she had been so careful.
Chapter Twenty
Jozef was looking forward to his seminar with Professor Zielinski. He enjoyed them. The professor’s relaxed, non-judgmental style had gently encouraged Jozef to open up over the course of the academic year. The delicate process was also helping Jozef slowly bloom in Berlin outside the classrooms and lecture theatres.
Everyone arrived on time today, which was a rarity. They sat snugly in a tight circle with the professor at its natural head. There were six undergraduates alongside Jozef – it was a full house.
The professor caught Jozef’s eye. He knew he had to put him at ease if he were to talk today and not be dominated by more confident
but perhaps less intelligent peers.
‘In February 1933, Hitler first addressed the German nation after becoming chancellor. He made them wait. If Germans were waiting for key details of his new policy at home and abroad, they would be disappointed. Hitler never went into detail in his speeches, I would argue, because it was never there. Of course, Hitler had goals – target the Jews and anyone else he believed were his enemies at home – but he did not have a grand plan, mapped out meticulously before him.’
The professor continued, ‘Hitler was arguably an old-fashioned opportunist. All he told the German people in February 1933 was “beware foreign help”, planting the seed in people’s minds that they should hold a very insular view of the world and a hostile outlook when they gazed beyond Germany’s borders.’
The morning sun radiated brightly outside. The blinds were closed, but light still glinted kindly through, relaxing the space.
Only Jozef was taking notes, noted Professor Zielinski.
‘In April 1933, a one-day boycott of Jewish shops and businesses was staged in Germany. If, in hindsight, it seems ominous to us, it didn’t at the time. Hitler was clever. He distanced himself from controversy in his early days of power when his grip on it was still fragile. In June 1934, a powerful politician in Germany, Franz von Papen, spoke out against Hitler. Von Papen said, “Germany must not board a train into the unknown when no one knows when it will stop”. No one listened.
‘The German people weren’t stupid, of course. They could see what was happening, but they felt only the ugly, unruly element within the Nazi party was to blame. They believed Hitler could not be blamed for every little thing that happened under his Chancellorship. He couldn’t control everything, they said. He was still the way forward. After all, the economy was healthy now and Germany had order.’
‘Why couldn’t anyone see?’ one female undergraduate asked earnestly. ‘Hitler was a monster.’
‘Power and fear,’ said the girl who spoke too much immediately, making the professor wince quietly. ‘People were scared of Hitler. What could they do against the Nazis? Speak out and you were killed.’
‘Well,’ said the professor, keen to quickly regain control of the room. ‘That is true, but not the whole truth. Jozef, you have been quiet so far today. What do you think?’ The professor did not like putting Jozef on the spot, but he felt he had to on occasion.
Jozef shuffled uneasily in his chair. His face flushed red and he felt the eyes of the room trained on him. He hated the sensation and wanted to run away. He gathered himself. I have to fight through this, he thought. ‘We like to see the good in people, professor,’ he began.
‘Yes,’ the professor encouraged.
It was the most intelligent thing anyone had said today.
‘How could, why would Jews really believe the Nazis would kill them? If I was a Jew during the war, I don’t think I would have believed it. Maybe people didn’t until it was too late.’
Jozef felt the hot colour begin to drain from his cheeks. He had still been embarrassed and uncomfortable talking, but he had got through it and he had said what he had wanted to say – and under, for him at least, an intense spotlight. He did not thank the professor for that at this moment, but then he resented that reaction. Jozef wanted to like the professor.
‘Excellent, Jozef,’ congratulated Professor Zielinski, who felt his thoughts tip back in time to the war and Poland. ‘Excellent. People want to see the good in people...’
* * *
It was 1942 and chillingly cold.
Men’s breaths crystallised into icy fogs in front of their faces. Professor Zielinski had found that romantic once, but romance had long left Warsaw. The professor and three friends were huddled tightly around a large tin drum, which housed a small fire burning weakly within. It was the best they could do. Each man had a balaclava on and gloves of some kind – the professor’s were fingerless. Why had he been so stupid in the rush of eviction to bring fingerless gloves? He hardly ever felt the tips of his fingers these days. Maybe the blood in his body would not bother travelling back down there soon. It would be afraid it was never coming back.
‘Have you heard the rumours?’ one man said.
‘Yes, I’ve heard the rumours,’ shrugged another.
‘What rumours?’ snapped the professor grumpily, reaching his hands as deep inside the drum as he dared.
‘They are sending us to camps to be killed,’ said the man, wrapping his arms around himself in an effort to keep warm.
‘Who told you that?’ growled the professor. ‘Don’t be so ridiculous.’
‘They are packing people away on trains, in cattle cars. You are given no food or water. There is only a bucket for people to relieve themselves in and they are packed in so tight there is no room to sit – for days. Can you imagine? The smell?’
‘Who told you that?’ demanded the professor again, growing increasingly angry. His instincts warned him that there was worrying detail in the lie. A little boy, moth-eaten and starving, tugged at the professor’s leg. He did not speak but simply pointed to his mouth.
‘I haven’t got anything child,’ said the professor, peering down at him impatiently and turning away momentarily from the group.
The boy was filthy. His teeth were black and rotting, and his eyes were sinking back into his head. Death was starting to take hold. Hunger did not allow the boy to concede defeat easily and he pulled again at the professor’s leg, harder this time.
‘Get off me boy!’ the professor shouted and kicked out a leg, flinging the child to the ground and into the gutter where human faeces were swimming. He felt a pang of humanity. ‘I’m sorry. I’m sorry, my boy,’ said the professor, reaching down to pick him up, but the boy beat him to it, readjusting his cap and scrambling to his feet before sprinting off.
‘Forget him,’ one of the men said and the professor turned back to the group.
‘When you reach the camp, everyone is hauled off trains and marched straight inside. They tell everyone to strip and they give you a bar of soap. Then you are marched through to a large room and they slam the doors behind you.’
The professor jumped when the man accentuated the word ‘slam’ and was immediately embarrassed for doing so.
* * *
‘Professor Zielinski?’ the girl who spoke too much said again.
The professor looked up. Six young people – clean and innocent – were staring at him. They looked concerned. It was sunny and warm and there was no danger in the room.
‘Miles away! My apologies,’ he said, hoping his students would not see the uncertainty and fear in his features.
Five didn’t. Jozef did.
‘That is all today. Good seminar. Well done everyone. Jozef, do you have a moment?’
‘Of course, professor.’
‘Jozef, I’ve thought long and hard about this, but I feel the time is right.’
‘The time is right for what?’ Jozef asked.
‘To show you something,’ said the professor, unbuttoning the cuffs of the sleeves of his shirt. ‘To show you this.’
A tattoo. Strange. Jozef had little experience of tattoos, but this was certainly not how he might have imagined one. He looked closer at it, curious. A small, inky row of numbers, fading on the inside of the professor’s wrist: 82367.
‘I was in Auschwitz.’
‘The concentration camp?’ said Jozef, unsure.
‘Yes. But it was a death camp, Jozef. It was a death camp.’
‘What was it like? How did you survive?’ said Jozef, firing questions at Professor Zielinski like gun shots.
‘Patience, patience,’ said the professor, who believed he had been right to tell his student, but who had not talked about it with anyone but fellow survivors before and even then, he had been guarded about what he had revealed. This felt right. Nearly fifteen years had passed. How many more did he have left – five? Ten? Fifteen maximum.
He unbuttoned the top button of his shirt, loosened his bow ti
e and looked calmly into Jozef’s eyes. The only other people to have looked at Jozef that intensely were his mother and Michael.
Jozef was listening.
‘Jozef,’ said the professor, lowering his gaze. ‘You must promise, you must absolutely promise, that what is said in this room when only we are present remains in this room. These words are not for the outside world. The outside world is not ready for what I am about to tell you, not yet.’
‘Of course,’ said Jozef. ‘You can trust me. Anyway, I have a secret I want to tell you.’
Chapter Twenty-One
Catharina’s mind was in disarray. She desperately wanted to see Janus, but now her motives were sharpened by last night’s dinner and the menace which Michael had whispered in her ear. She had been so intoxicated by the situation that she could not recall what he had uttered precisely. She wished she could, so she could relay the information faithfully to Janus. He would know what to do. She trusted him. He had survived the Nazis and the Red Army. A brief affair with a married, middle-class woman hardly compared, she thought.
Her mind span off again in another direction, then back to last night and what specifically Michael had said. All she could remember was recoiling violently from the table to the ladies’ restroom. She remembered that nauseous moment vividly. She came to her senses and realised the teaspoon she was about to place next to the kitchen sink, newly cleaned, was not clean at all. She had missed a tiny chunk of egg on its back. Gerhard must have left it there after breakfast.
Catharina slept deeply for more than an hour that afternoon. She often catnapped for ten minutes on the sofa, but she was rarely so exhausted in the day that she climbed back into bed, fully clothed for comfort. When she woke her head had finally stopped spinning. Sleep had drugged the dizzying sensation. She could think clearly again.
She stood in front of her mirror. She had wanted to wear her favourite dress again for her second date with Janus, but she felt she could not. She had to wear something different. That night was gone, she told herself. She could not recapture it. Things had changed. He might not even show. She ran her hands down the seams of her skirt. Her head was starting to whirl again. She had poured herself a small whisky and water to help calm the sensation. Gerhard’s suspicions had been aroused, she felt.