Ludwig sat up and looked under the bed for his shoes.
“In two days I’m off to the front. Some never come back, or come back in such a state they wish they had not come back.”
“Quiet,” said Marianne, pulling him back down to her.
He shook her off, stood up, and clasped his hands to his breast.
“Hello, Mr. Pfeifer. Hello, Mr. Brackmann. Would you not agree, Mr. Pfeifer, music is something quite wonderful. Yes, Mr. Brackmann.”
“Leave my father out of this.”
“Now, you will have my Marianne back home in good time for the concert on the radio. …”
“He has nothing to do with this.”
“There was a time when we went to concerts.”
She got up and tried to grab him, but instead clutched only air.
“I told you to stop.”
“But today, you see, in these difficult times …” “Stop it, I said.” She hit him.
“Don’t ever do that again.” Ludwig twisted her arm. “You’re hurting me.”
He let her go, sat down in the armchair in the corner of the room, and impatiently tugged at his shoelaces.
“Damn it…” He hurled the broken shoelace on the floor.
She sat next to him on the arm of the chair. “Why are you always so angry?” She ran her fingers through his hair.
“You should give me a lock of your hair when they cut it short.”
Ludwig rubbed his head against her upper body.
“I will look after it, and then when you come back we can burn it together.”
He undid the first button on her blouse and slipped his hand in. Marianne drew back.
“Come on,” he said, opening the other buttons. She looked over to the door.
“He won’t come in. He’s listening to music.”
Marianne shook her head.
“Come on,” he said, “come on.”
She twisted her torso away from him, did up her buttons, and went to the door.
“Listen,” Ludwig said, dropping down on the bed. “Even Erna has done it already.”
She stood still and looked at him in disbelief.
“Eckstein told me.”
Marianne frowned, as if in deep concentration for a long moment, then smiled at him.
“Werner didn’t have time to tell you.” She opened the door.
“When you were on the Ferris wheel with Erna, when you were up at the top and waved down at us and we were buying a bottle of beer. Right after the old acrobat and her husband.”
Ludwig clasped his hands behind his head.
“Afterward they washed the sheets, which his mother saw. Because she came back early, she immediately knew everything.”
“You’re lying.”
Marianne went into the living room where her father was sitting next to the radio. As she started to embrace him, he motioned her to be still.
Ludwig grumpily tucked his shirt into his trousers — it had traveled up over his flat stomach — then followed Marianne and sat down next to her father on the sofa.
2.
I’ll give it to her right away, thought Ludwig, I’ll give it to her right away, and then I still have two hours and she won’t be able to refuse. One hour is enough, he thought, and then if I go directly to the club I’ll still be in time for bowling. Or I’ll take her home and join them later to say good-bye when they’re having their beer. He passed Marianne the small box made of black cardboard.
“Here you are,” he said, his eyes on her breasts as she took off the lid and carefully unfolded the tissue paper.
“Oh,” Marianne went up on her tiptoes, “that is so sweet of you.” She gave him a kiss.
“Look, P. L.” Ludwig pointed at the heart. “My initials.”
She held the pendant in her hands and kissed it.
“So that you never forget me.” Ludwig smiled bashfully, then put his hands behind his back.
She turned around and held her hair up. Ludwig took the chain and held it round her neck.
He had bought it off one of his old classmates who had brought it back with some other items of jewelry from the front. You could get everything cheaper there, his friend had told him, you simply went to the Ghetto Administration and handed in your order. It seemed like the land of milk and honey to him, so many beautiful things and so cheap.
Actually, Ludwig had been looking for something more reasonably priced, something silver or nickel — it was not an engagement present, after all, he did not want the girl to have false hopes — but then because of the letters engraved on the flat surface of the heart, he had opted for it.
He fumbled at the tiny golden catch. It slipped from his fingers and he cursed under his breath. On the third attempt he managed. Marianne turned around and showed him the necklace. He nodded with satisfaction. The heart lay nestled at the base of her neck.
“Beautiful,” he said. “It looks good on you.”
Ludwig circled Marianne’s hips and led her up a narrow path to the clearing. No one ever comes here, he thought, and pressing her against him, he looked at his watch.
When they got there, he settled down on the damp earth, covered in leaves. On the right-hand side, low conifers edged the clearing. Behind him lay long dark tree trunks. Ludwig pushed himself back and leaned against them. He tapped the ground.
“Come here,” he said, “sit next to me.”
He took off his jacket and spread it on the ground.
“Come here, I won’t touch you.”
Marianne giggled, then sat down next to him, fingering the heart. It hung cool against her neck.
“Seventeen,” said Ludwig, pointing to the figure the loggers had written on the trunk.
“Will you write to me?”
“Yes.” Ludwig kissed her ear.
“Everyday?”
“Yes.”
He looked at her knee. He would really have to hurry things along to make the bowling evening. He embraced Marianne and as she was talking inched her skirt up.
“Yes,” he said, “yes, indeed, every Saturday.” He clasped her knee.
Not a bad knee, he thought, and left his hand there. If I go too quickly, he thought, she won’t let me do it. Carefully his fingers reached her thigh and he felt himself grow hard between his legs.
“My heart,” he said, “belongs to you now.”
“I will write to you, too, then we will be close and can share everything, and when you come back …”
Ludwig slipped down until his back touched the ground, turned on his side, and lay on top of Marianne.
“And when I come back,” he said, rubbing his lower body against her thighs, “then we’ll get married.”
“Yes,” said Marianne and pushed his hand away, because he was holding on to her breast so tightly that it hurt.
3.
Now he is taking me up the path, thought Marianne, so that he can try again. There’s never anyone there, now I’ll have to let him. Everyone in the class has done it already, Erna too, and now it’s my turn. She gave him a kiss.
“That’s very sweet of you,” she said, and made him fasten the necklace.
Now she was really someone. She, too, had her man whom she could worry about — he was going off to war, after all — and whom she could bring cakes to, for they never ate enough in the army. She would watch him compassionately as he wolfed it down. That was the best compliment that could be made about a cake.
She fingered the necklace. A beautiful necklace. Tomorrow she would show it to her classmates, while he was receiving his first orders. And of course I’ll show it to Erna, she thought. Erna had been given a bright blue stuffed animal, and a gingerbread heart, which seemed ridiculous compared to her farewell gift, and Erna was bound to think so, too.
“Come here,” he said, tapping the ground.
She had heard that the hymen could be broken by doing gymnastics, performing a cartwheel. She had tried, but did not believe it had worked, since you were meant to feel pa
in afterward.
Even if it hurts, she thought, it’s not serious. At least I’ll have it out of the way at last.
“Come on,” he said, and spread his jacket out.
She sat down next to him on the ground and regarded his profile. A little nose, with an upward tilt. Like a pig, thought Marianne. She laughed.
He will do it any minute now. She fiddled with a dry leaf. I hope he doesn’t crease my skirt. Perhaps I should take it off? No, then I would be stark naked.
“Aha,” she said, and looked down at her skirt, which was crumpled now anyway because he was leaning over her to point out the number on the tree trunk. Rotten luck, she thought. It was out of the question now. She had intended to wear the skirt tomorrow along with the same blouse and woolen jacket, so that her classmates in the morning and Erna in the afternoon could see what she had worn. They should know every detail.
“Will you write to me?”
“Yes.”
“Everyday?” “Of course …”
Or, she thought as he caressed her knee, I could hang the skirt in the bathroom this evening, perhaps the steam will get out the creases.
“I’ll even write to you tomorrow from the barracks, and on Saturday you can come and visit me.”
Now he’s going to lie down on top of me. Marianne saw a drop of sweat on his top lip. Why is he sweating like that, she thought, it’s happening too fast, and she asked him whether he had seen the film set in Tivoli.
“It’s a tragedy about the farmers in the mountains.”
She told him about Lona, the heroine, who was twenty years younger than her husband Thomas, who had a farm far from the beaten trail and a farmhand by the name of Martin whom Lona was in love with.
“This disastrous passion brings about her ruin,” said Mari- anne and quietly repeated her sentence as he was rubbing his lower body against her knee.
Like a dog gone wild, she thought, and wriggled straight underneath him.
“My heart,” he said, “my heart.” She felt his heart pounding against her stomach.
He reached under her skirt and with one tug pulled down her panties. She had chosen them especially for this occasion — panties with a flower pattern that matched her bra, which now hung crookedly over her breasts. He did not notice the pattern, simply tore them down and threw them in a wide arc through the air to the side.
Now I am his woman, she thought, looking at a tree trunk with crumbling bark. She fingered the heart. If he were to fall in war, she would keep it as an eternal reminder of this day. She would also show it to the child that they were perhaps even now creating. It is a noble souvenir, she thought, one that could be shown to a child without any second thought, even if the father had fallen on the front. She sighed. She would also keep the medal. On his thirteenth birthday she would solemnly give it to her son.
“Now,” he said, “now, and now, and now.”
And then it was over. He rolled off her, sat up, wiped his sweaty forehead with the back of his hand, pulled up his trousers, which hung about his knees, and looked at his watch.
Yes, now I am his woman, she thought, and dabbed at her leg with her panties, while he was doing up his trousers, to stop the trickle of the sticky white liquid.
4.
They went down the small path together. They waited at the tram stop. Ludwig paid and sat down next to her. They passed the football stadium, which was empty now. At the second stop an old man and a lady with three children got on. The children raced around the empty car. Marianne offered them a bag of sweets. Slowly the tram filled up.
When they got there, Ludwig let Marianne get down first, then he leaped down the three steps. He had actually intended to take her only as far as the street corner, but took her right up to her door and, although she had not asked him to, went upstairs with her too.
Marianne’s mother was waiting. She had just put water on to boil for coffee and there was apple cake.
At five o’clock Ludwig was still at Marianne’s, at six o’clock too, but he had stopped looking at his watch. At seven o’clock he got up to leave. Marianne went with him to the door, and it quietly shut behind them. They stood for a while in the corridor. A man carrying a coal bucket went past them and up to the third floor. They heard him unlocking his apartment door, pushing the coal bucket through with his foot, and the sound of the door closing. Then all was quiet again. They sat on the stone steps. He embraced her. She laid her head on his shoulder. The streetlights went on outside.
5.
The following day she showed Erna her gold necklace — it was much admired — and looked up the medical encyclopedia. It had a place of honor in the bookshelves next to the atlas, the dictionary, Mein Kampf, the Bible, and the color picture book of plants and trees of Germany. Erna had gotten it from her godmother for Christmas, since she had found it more properly educational than the dress that had been requested, complete with a deep scooped neckline designed for nothing but manhunting. Erna did that anyway, even without the dress or the neckline, and captured her first man, called Ecki, one Saturday afternoon at the Bowling Club. His real name was Werner and he was half a year older than she.
There it was in black and white:
There had been a stiffening, engendered by the congestion of blood, of the part of the body equipped with erectile tissue and residing between the curves of the groin — known in brief as the male sexual organ — which she could now admire in both cross and longitudinal sections. The stiffening was a tensing up that began in the cerebral cortex, proceeded down through the diencephalon and the spinal cord, finally reaching the nether regions, and was occasioned by the touching of the pair of hemispherical glandular organs on the front of the female upper body, which were winking up at the sky because the flowery bra had slipped up, and which he first fondled with his fingers before suckling on them with the fleshy upper and lower rim of the opening of his digestive canal.
Ah-huh, she thought, and looked at the erectile tissue, the glans, the urethra, and the scrotum, marked in red, which if she was not mistaken she had felt against her perineum or sphincter, when the male sexual organ had penetrated the female sexual organ. Ah-huh, she thought, and she also looked at the female sexual organ, of which there was a diagram too, made up of a vagina, a uterine orifice, two ovaries, an ovum, and a uterus, in which perhaps even now the fruit of her love was ripening. She read through everything with exactitude, then looked up frightened.
“Listen,” she said, “I don’t think he has that.”
“Doesn’t have what?”
“You know, he didn’t push anything up.”
“Didn’t push what up?”
“You know, the foreskin.”
“That’s not possible.”
“I certainly didn’t see it.”
“Maybe you looked away at that moment.”
“I did not.”
“Then you just weren’t paying attention.” “Believe me, I was.”
“Well then, he must have a Jewish willy.”
“He does not.”
“Well, then, you just didn’t see it. I definitely would be surprised if he did have one.”
“If he had a what?”
“A Jewish willy.”
“He does not,” she said, furious.
“That’s what I mean,” responded Erna.
“But how do you know that he doesn’t?” asked Marianne.
“They wouldn’t take him on then.”
“Do you think so?”
“Yes, sure,” replied Erna. “Do you think they want Jews in the Wehrmacht?”
She shook her head. Ah, the Wehrmacht, she thought, that makes our men men, and protects our homeland, and will conquer the world victoriously, thank goodness we have it.
Proudly she grasped the heart with his initials engraved on it. It bounced against her throat and would remind her of him until he came back to marry her. She would bake cakes for him and iron his shirts and darn his socks and make roasts and have lots of sons. She wou
ld bear sons for him and for the Führer, for the will for a child was there, and where there is a will there is a way.
And all of a sudden that poem about the Wehrmacht came to mind that she had learned by heart: “He who runs to the flag, he who burns for the flag, he who knows the flag, will be steel,” a poem that she now for the first time fully and completely understood. And with one hand she cradled the heart, which was not made of steel but of gold-plated silver, and with the other hand her belly, in which perhaps even now the fruit of her love was ripening.
Statement of the Officer for Accounts
(The Stamp Collection)
ON OUR DAY OF ARRIVAL, TOWARD ONE O’CLOCK — I had just taken up my quarters and had almost finished unpacking — Vogt, a member of our unit, came into the room and announced that a convoy of Jews was approaching.
“They have come from Wilna,” he said and added that we would be able to see them pass through if we left that minute.
We had chosen the school for our living quarters, since it had central heating and space enough.
Although the civil population certainly would not have objected — their impeccable attitude had been picked out for special praise several times in the circular that we received once a week — I did not believe that the Jews would be driven into the village.
Vogt, well known for his opinion, asked me if I wanted to watch the convoy.
His exact words were: “We should not miss this piece of theater.”
Since I didn’t have any urge to write the letter I owed my mother, I took my jacket down from its hook and went with him. Corporal Zink joined us.
We took a shortcut over the field, crossed a stream that was already freezing at the banks, and thanks to Vogt’s spurring us on we reached the country road after a good quarter of an hour. They would have to come by this way, approaching, as they were, from the north.
We got there in the nick of time. We only just managed to group loosely around the boundary stone that marked the field when we already saw the convoy in the distance, rapidly approaching.
Roughly estimating, there were around three hundred people. They walked in rows of four. On every coat and jacket the yellow star was attached.
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