Playing for the Commandant

by Suzy Zail

  I looked past the piano and the first row of chairs and saw Karl. He’d stopped dozing and was doodling on a napkin, oblivious to the exchange between his father and the dentist. My nausea dissipated, replaced by — I wasn’t sure what — rage, disgust, despair. All I knew was that I wanted to tear the napkin from Karl’s hands, drag him to the table, and force him to look into the jar until that cold, hard face of his registered something other than indifference. I’d misjudged him. Karl didn’t hate Jews. He just didn’t care. That’s why he didn’t bother raising his head to look at the jar, and that’s why he hadn’t told his father about the stolen carrot. The war, our imprisonment, his father’s role in the camps — none of it mattered to him. The only thing that mattered to Karl Jager was Karl Jager.

  The commandant passed the gold ingot back to his guest.

  “Nice watch.” The dentist looked up from the commandant’s wrist. “Pink gold, eighteen carat, a Jaeger-LeCoultre if I’m not mistaken?”

  “Yes, given to me by my father.” The commandant looked down at his watch. “I don’t know why I still wear it. It doesn’t keep the time like it used to.”

  “Then you must give it to me.” The dentist held out his hand. “I’ll have it fixed. There’s a workshop in the camp — one fellow in particular with a knack for repairs. He restored my old pocket watch just last month.”

  A watchmaker with a knack for repairs? Does he wear glasses? Does he have a scar on his chin? I pictured my father bent over a workbench, surrounded by broken watches and an arsenal of spare parts.

  Someone coughed. Startled, I looked up. The dentist was staring at me. So was the commandant. I looked down at my hands. They were frozen over the piano. I’d stopped playing. I’d cut short Beethoven’s bagatelle! The commandant unfolded himself from his chair, raised his baton, and took a step toward me.

  “Herr Jager. It’s Lottie.” Stanislaw rushed into the room. “I think she’s choking.” The commandant’s baton clattered to the floor, and he ran from the room. The dentist excused himself, pocketing a chocolate as he left, and then it was just Karl and me. My heart slammed against my chest. I’d just escaped a beating by the commandant, and there was Karl, two rows back, his father’s baton on the floor in front of him. He only had to reach out and wrap his fingers around it . . .

  Karl stood up slowly. He stepped away from his chair, turned for the door, and walked out of the room without a backward glance. No one came for a long time. I stood in the corner, feet together, arms by my sides, listening for footsteps. The house was quiet, but there was movement in the garden, a panting sound and then a muffled whimpering. I inched forward and looked out the window. Lottie lay on her side on the wet grass. The commandant was on his knees, bent over her, his arms wrapped around her body, his cheek pressed against her fur. Stanislaw stood behind him.

  Eventually, the commandant rose to his feet and turned to the gardener. “Dig her a grave under the plum tree.” He looked back at the dog. “She’d like that.” He disappeared from view. I heard a door swing open, then click shut. A car started.

  I returned to my corner. Later that afternoon, at the sound of the commandant’s voice, I crept to the window. Captain Jager was standing at the edge of Lottie’s grave, staring at the sad mound of dirt. He motioned for the gardener to approach. Stanislaw had a bunch of red poppies in his hand. He stepped onto the grave and laid the flowers on the heaped soil.

  “Verschwinde! Verschwinde!” the commandant yelled at Stanislaw. “Get off the grave!” The commandant rammed the old man with both hands, sending the gardener tumbling backward onto the grass. Stanislaw’s head hit the dirt with a thud. I stepped back from the window. I didn’t want to see any more.

  “You imbecile . . .” The commandant’s anger seeped through the walls. Stanislaw mumbled Lottie’s name. He asked the commandant to forgive his mistake, and then everything went quiet and I heard Captain Jager say, “A mistake?” He said it twice and then he said something else. He said, “Well, so is this.”

  I rammed my hands over my ears, but I still heard the gunshot. The sound leaked through my fingers. I bent my head and cried into my hands.

  I cried for a long time, half hoping the commandant would find me in tears and order me back to camp. I didn’t want to share my music with the commandant or his son, and I was sick of pretending that I did. I’d always played the piano, if not brilliantly, then at least with integrity. Now I lied every time I sat down.

  I mopped the tears from my face and wiped my nose on my sleeve. I needed this job. Erika needed food, and this was the only place I could get it.

  The commandant’s clock chimed the hour. It was five o’clock. I walked down the hall, pulled my new winter coat from its peg on the wall, and slipped my arms through the sleeves. The moon glowed in the darkening sky. In a few moments, a guard would come to take me back to camp. I peeked into the kitchen. Ivanka was stuffing a cabbage leaf into her mouth.

  “The commandant’s out,” she whispered, grabbing another leaf. I walked into the room and grabbed a cabbage leaf from the colander. To hell with it. Stanislaw was dead. I might’ve been, too, if Lottie hadn’t choked when she did. No one was safe here. It didn’t matter whether you played by the rules and kept your head down; you could still be shot. I wasn’t safe, no matter what I did.

  I stuffed the cabbage leaf into my secret pocket. A pot of water simmered on the stove. I plunged my hand into the hot stock, pulled out a handful of diced vegetables, and slipped them into my pocket.

  “I thought you didn’t break the rules.” I looked up at the sound of Vera’s voice. She was staring at my coat pocket.

  “I know we’re not meant to take food from the house but . . .” I swallowed hard.

  Vera shook her head. “I didn’t say don’t steal. I said don’t get caught.” She reached for the rubbish bin and headed for the door.

  “Can I take the rubbish out tonight?” I asked, stepping toward her, eyeing a potato peel poking from the bin. Vera looked down at the bin, saw the peel, hesitated, then handed me the bin. “Sure. We can take turns.”

  I walked outside, plucking the peel from the bin, when something caught my eye. It was Karl’s napkin, crushed into a ball. It was the one he’d scribbled on earlier in the day. I shoved the peel into my pocket, put the bin down, and pulled out the napkin. Karl hadn’t been scribbling. He’d drawn a piano on the napkin, a baby grand with a shiny black lid and black and white keys. There was a stool tucked under the piano and a butterfly hovering above it, its wings delicately veined in black ink. And then over it all, piercing the butterfly’s wings and tearing at the soft leather of the stool, was a length of barbed wire. Karl had etched the spikes onto the napkin with such force that he’d torn through the cloth.

  I stuffed the napkin into my pocket and ran back to the kitchen, skidding to a stop when I walked through the door. Mr. Zielinski was at the workbench, peeling a carrot, and Karl was standing over him.

  “I — I was just putting out the rubbish,” I stammered, though no one had asked. Mr. Zielinski passed Karl a carrot. Karl didn’t look up. I don’t know why I thought he would, why I imagined there was some part of him that wasn’t completely anesthetized. So he sang and he could draw. That didn’t mean he had a heart.

  “We’re going to make it home, Erika. We’re going to see Papa again. I heard someone talking about him at the villa. Papa’s alive! He has a job fixing watches.”

  Erika smiled weakly. I pulled a cabbage leaf from my pocket and pressed it into her palm. It wasn’t the most elegant dining room, but the latrine block at Birkenau was the safest place to share my spoils, so we sat on the ground and swatted flies and ate cold diced carrots and potato peels. I passed Erika a beet peel. “Keep it for the next selection,” I whispered. “Rub it on your cheeks to redden them.” Erika nodded. We’d seen women pinch their cheeks before presenting themselves for inspection, but the healthy flush soon drained from their faces. Beet juice would work better.

  “I’ve ne
ver stolen before,” I told my sister, feeling ashamed and proud at the same time.

  “I know.” Erika squeezed my hand. “Thank you.”

  I looked at my sister’s narrow shoulders and bony kneecaps. She was the size of a ten-year-old.

  “Remember what you said to me, Erika, back at the brickyard? You said that you’d do whatever it takes to get us back to Debrecen.”

  I wondered whether my sister had even heard me.

  “I know,” she said finally, her voice bleak. “I’ve let you down. I’m sorry.”

  “No, that’s not what I meant.” I grabbed her hand. “What I was trying to say was that it’s time I grew up and took care of myself.” The last thing I wanted to do was make Erika feel guilty. She hated not being able to play the protective big sister. I’d seen it on her face when I’d pulled the cabbage leaf from my pocket. I saw it every time I helped her out of bed. I looked into her big, sad eyes. “I’m almost sixteen, Erika. I’m not a kid anymore.” I pressed the last scraps into her palm and stood to leave. “There’s something I have to do. You stay here and finish eating.”

  Since I’d arrived at Birkenau, I’d been careful to avoid the block leader, so she was surprised, and a little suspicious, when I approached her in the barrack.

  “What do you want?” She narrowed her eyes.

  “I don’t want anything,” I said. “I’m here to give you something.”

  “And what might that be?” She grabbed my arm and walked me to the front door, away from prying eyes.

  “A little token of my appreciation,” I whispered, passing her a cabbage leaf.

  “You’re not as dumb as you look.” She plunged the vegetable into her pocket. “I hope you don’t think this will buy you any favors.”

  “Favors?” I acted offended. “No, of course not. It’s only that, now that my mother is gone, I guess you’re the only one who’s looking out for me, looking out for all of us. Anyway, I just wanted to say there’s more where that came from, and thank you.”

  The block leader nodded. She didn’t want me to think that she could be bought, but we both knew how it worked. If I gave her an apple, she’d make sure I made it back to the commandant’s villa the next day so I could steal another. And if Erika gave her a turnip or a beet, she’d look out for my sister, too.

  Erika was frail, and over the next weeks, she only grew frailer. I wished I could take better care of her. I fed her scraps from the commandant’s table, but she still had to march to work and haul stones and dig up earth. She had to stand bare-legged at roll call in a thin cotton dress while I waited beside her, warm in my long winter coat. She had to stand naked at selection, while I sat inside and waited. If it was raining, she stayed wet all day. I spent my days sitting on a leather stool in stockinged feet in front of a fire. Erika knew all this, and still she waited for me at the barrack door at the end of each day and pulled me close at bedtime so that we might keep each other warm.

  It had been months since we’d seen our father and weeks since I’d returned from the commandant’s house to find my mother gone. I still caught myself watching for my mother’s shape as the women returned from the quarry at night. I missed her voice, and I missed my father’s smile. I thought I saw him once — a stooped figure slowly walking up a hill — but it wasn’t Papa, just a farmer with the same slight frame and curly brown hair.

  Erika shared my mother’s high cheekbones; I had my father’s long lashes and his nose. We liked to fall asleep looking at each other. It was the only way to keep them close. There were nights I missed my parents so badly that I wanted to grab the block leader by the throat. I was sure she knew what had become of them. Instead I gave her whatever food I could scrounge. There were dozens of starving girls who needed the food more, and who were more deserving of it, but none of those skinny, hollow-eyed girls could tell me where my parents were or put in a good word for my sister if a job became available in Canada.

  I’d been to the warehouse twice since learning about it from Vera. The first time was to trade my silk scarf for margarine, the second time to trade a stolen carving knife for a pair of boots for Erika. The storeroom was what I imagined heaven would look like — heaven for a prisoner: tables laden with bread, jam, sugar, and chocolate, and shelves lined with shampoo, soap, perfume, and combs. Slippers and brassieres lay in neat piles on the floor, and girls with colored kerchiefs and gray smocks wandered the aisles. Hundreds of workers kept the storeroom shelves stocked, and still the women couldn’t keep up with the stream of goods flowing through the doors.

  Autumn made way for winter, and the cold Polish sun disappeared behind clouds. Outside the music-room window, only a few leaves of deep red clung to the plum tree. Everything was tinted gray: the fog, the thick mud that clung to our shoes, our faces. Birkenau’s barbed-wire fences and watchtowers tipped me toward hopelessness. There was no escaping, and no end to the war. We heard fighter planes scream overhead, and one night saw the sky red and raining down with bombs. But when dawn came, the barracks stood unharmed, and the band still played a death march. I still had to trudge to the villa, Erika still had to dig trenches, and the guards still had guns.

  The Jewish New Year, Rosh Hashanah, passed without fanfare. I couldn’t sing the praises of a God I no longer believed in, or wish Erika Happy New Year. When the holiest of religious days, Yom Kippur, arrived, at the end of September, I didn’t fast. I swallowed my coffee defiantly and refused to ask God to forgive my sins. And when we fell into bed and a woman in the next bunk sang Avinu Malkeinu, I didn’t join in. “Hear our prayer,” she whispered. “Sh’ma kolenu. Inscribe us for blessing in the Book of Life.”

  It was easy to die in Birkenau: You looked a guard in the eye or stumbled from the line on the way to the washroom. I saw a girl refuse to get out of bed and another spit at a guard. They were both dragged outside and shot. I wasn’t going to help death along. I stole, but I wasn’t stupid. I took risks, but they were calculated. I wanted to make it out alive, so I did things I wasn’t proud of. I stayed silent when other girls were beaten, and I stole from an inmate. I woke up one morning to find the girl who’d been sleeping beside me was dead, so I did what I’d seen dozens of girls do before me: I searched her pockets for a crust of bread. I couldn’t eat the handful of crumbs I found; I gave them to Erika.

  In Debrecen I’d left behind a beautiful wall calendar. Each page had a scene from a famous opera and a portrait of a composer whose birthday fell on that month. I shared my December birthday with Beethoven. Clara Schumann’s was in September. I’d wanted to pack the calendar, but there hadn’t been room for it. In Birkenau, there was no need for it. Calendared time didn’t matter in the camp. It only mattered that I made it to the commandant’s home every morning, sat down at his piano, and played the right chords. Every day was the same as the day before: the commandant and his guests would have morning tea and talk over Bach, and Karl would sit sullenly in the corner. Every day was a repeat of the day before. Every day was tedious and gray until one day in November, when everything changed.

  The commandant, Karl, and I were in the music room. Vera had been sent to the kitchen to make tea.

  “What’s taking her so long?” the commandant grumbled. “For heaven’s sake, go see what the hold up is.”

  I ran to the kitchen, turned into the doorway, and slumped to my knees. Vera was lying on the kitchen floor on a bed of shattered porcelain.

  “Vera, what happened?” She looked like a broken doll. Limp tea leaves clung to her dress, and her scarf was slick with blood. She opened her mouth, but no sound came out. I lifted her head from the floor.

  “Vera, who did this to you?” Her eyes flickered toward the window. A guard was pacing the driveway, SS standard issue — cropped blond hair, hard blue eyes, crisp gray uniform — one of a dozen faceless guards who patrolled the grounds. I turned back to Vera.

  “What happened?”

  “He hit me, I fell backward . . .”

  “But why?”

 
“I couldn’t . . .” She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. Hanna, I need you to do something.”

  “Of course, Vera. Anything.” I reached up, pulled a rag from the bench, folded it, and slipped it under her head.

  “I need you to . . .” Vera closed her eyes.

  “What Vera? What do you need me to do?” I leaned down. I was so close, I could feel her lips brush the tip of my ear.

  “I need you to take over the laundry shift. Tell Karl I said it was okay.” She let out a thin cry. “It hurts.”

  “You’re going to be okay,” I said. What I wanted to say was, Please don’t die. And then Karl walked in. “She needs help. Please. Get some help.”

  “What happened?” Karl asked without looking at me.

  “Yes. What happened?” the commandant echoed, stepping into the room. I looked through the window at the guard, who was now seated on a bench, his head in his hands. It was safer not to accuse anyone and let the commandant work it out.

  “Klaus!” the commandant hollered, stepping outside.

  “Please. She needs a doctor.” I turned to Karl. He was watching his father guiding the guard back into the house.

  “I’ll put a phone call through to Lagerführerin Holzman.” The commandant stepped over Vera as he spoke to Klaus. “She’ll arrange a replacement. Let’s hope she’s better at making tea.” He looked down at Vera, sprawled on the floor.

  “Father, shouldn’t she be seen to? Your physician isn’t far. . . .”

  The commandant looked at his son. “Dr. Huber has better things to do,” he began, “but perhaps you’re right.” He stopped to consider his son’s suggestion. “She mustn’t die here. Too messy. Klaus, take her back to Birkenau.” And then he stalked out.