Children of the Promise

by Dean Hughes

  The elders walked the several blocks quickly. They didn’t go into the ghetto but followed a street along the edge of it. They could still see nothing but smoke, however, until they turned the corner onto the street where the fire was. And then, both of them stopped. “The synagogue!” Elder Thomas said.

  That beautiful old building. It had never occurred to Elder Thomas that anyone—even the Nazis—would do such a thing.

  The two approached, but they stayed in the background, away from the crowd. The cupola at the front corner of the building had already caved in, and flames were gushing from the roof. The synagogue was a magnificent stone structure with stained glass windows, but the windows were broken now, and inside all was ablaze. Elder Thomas thought of the vaulted ceilings, the dark woodwork, the hand-built stairways—all of that craftsmanship, gone.

  A big crowd had gathered, but people were only watching, and they appeared solemn. They stood with their hands behind their backs or their arms folded in front of them. Elder Thomas looked for uniforms—maybe brown-shirted Storm Troopers—but he saw none. Some women were huddled at the back of the crowd in little bunches, but most were men in coats and hats. A few boys were wearing Hitler Youth uniforms, but they watched in awe, clearly more impressed by the furious fire than by political ideas.

  “I don’t get this,” Elder Mecham said. “They’re all just watching. Who set the fire?”

  “Nazis. Party members, I would guess,” Elder Thomas whispered. “These people had nothing to do with it.”

  “Why didn’t anyone try to put it out? It makes me sick.”

  Elder Thomas felt much the same. And yet, he understood better than Elder Mecham. He had been in Germany long enough to understand the way Nazis operated—and the way the people reacted. Fear was a factor in almost every decision.

  “I want a picture,” Elder Mecham said. “I want proof.”

  “Maybe we’d just better—”

  “Stand in front of me. I’ll take my camera out of its case. Then I’ll take a quick shot over your shoulder.”

  “Wait a minute.”

  Elder Thomas scanned the street, checked behind them. But no one seemed to be paying any attention to them. “Okay,” he said. “Just snap one picture, and then let’s go. President Wood would die if he knew we were here.”

  Elder Mecham stepped behind Elder Thomas, but he stayed close, and Elder Thomas could tell he was fumbling to get his camera out. “Hurry. Do it now,” Elder Thomas told him.

  In another few seconds, he felt the camera, or actually Elder Mecham’s big fists, rest on his shoulder, and he held his breath until he heard the shutter release. But then he couldn’t resist. “Okay, let me get a shot,” he said.

  This was not like Elder Thomas. He had been trained by his vigilant stake president father. Elder Thomas’s name, David Alexander, the same as his father’s, had identified him all his life. At East High, in Salt Lake City, he had been “Alex,” but he had also been “President Thomas’s boy.” His good looks—his dark, wavy hair and earnest brown eyes—gave him the look of a movie star. But there was nothing mysterious or suggestive about the clean lines of his face. He was exactly what he seemed: up front, reliable, even predictable. He didn’t break rules.

  Elder Mecham stepped forward, and Elder Thomas got his own camera out. He shot around Elder Mecham, not over him, and he took slightly longer to get the picture framed. He had snapped the shot and was pulling the camera back inside his coat when he heard someone say, in German, “What are you doing there?”

  Elder Thomas tucked the camera inside his coat, under his arm, and stepped back to Elder Mecham’s side. He tried to appear natural, but his heart was suddenly beating hard. A man was crossing the narrow street and coming toward them. Elder Thomas thought the man must have come out of a house or an alley. He hadn’t been anywhere in sight when he had pulled his camera out.

  “Making pictures?” the man asked as he walked closer. Elder Thomas took a better look. He saw what he feared: the black uniform with silver trim, the braided hat. Gestapo.

  Elder Thomas said nothing for a moment. He was trying to think what to do. “Yes, I took a picture,” he finally said breathlessly. “Isn’t that acceptable?”

  “Wo kommen Sie her? England?”

  “Nein. Aus Amerika.”

  And then, in English, “If you think it is not wrong to take pictures, why do you hide your camera?”

  Elder Thomas answered in German. “I . . . was not certain.”

  “What is your name?” the agent said, again in English.

  “Alex Thomas. We’re missionaries. I’m sorry if I did something wrong.”

  The agent was silent for a time, as though he were deciding what to do. “Of course you have done nothing wrong. We have no laws against making photographs.” His voice had turned sugary, maybe ironic, and Elder Thomas didn’t know what to make of it. “I would expect, however, that you would make photographs of our castles and rivers—not of this unfortunate fire.”

  “Yes. Usually . . . that’s the kind of pictures I take.”

  “It’s a terrible thing these people have done, lighting this fine building on fire.” The agent was rather hefty but hard, and his eyes, veiled by heavy black eyebrows, were steady. He looked up at Elder Mecham. “Don’t you agree, my big friend?”

  Elder Mecham nodded, but he said nothing.

  “And what is your name, sir?”

  “Mecham. Lewis Mecham.”

  “My, my. Two such fine young men, and here to teach the German people religion.”

  Elder Thomas said softly, stubbornly in German, “We were uncertain what was happening. We just came to look.”

  “A Jewish boy killed one of our Germans in Paris. And I’m afraid these people are angry about that. They set this synagogue on fire this morning, and the fire brigade put it out. But the people only came back and started the fire again. It’s bad, the things that can happen when people become very, very angry.” He hesitated. “Wouldn’t you say so, Mr. Thomas?”

  He opened his coat and placed his gloved hand on his hip. He was letting the elders see a long nightstick hanging from his belt. His thick lips puckered into a nasty smile, and his eyes held firm, as though daring Elder Thomas to react.

  Elder Thomas said nothing.

  “So what do you think of these German people, doing this?”

  Elder Thomas had had enough of this. “Could we go now? We don’t want any trouble.”

  “Of course you may go, Mr. Thomas. I’m not keeping you here. I thought you wanted to see this terrible fire.” He motioned toward the building. “Step closer, if you like.”

  “We already saw it,” Elder Mecham said, in English, his voice showing his irritation.

  Elder Thomas knew he couldn’t let anything get started. He took hold of Elder Mecham’s arm, began to turn him. “We’ll go now,” he said to the agent.

  “Ach. Only one matter, first.”

  The Elders stopped.

  “I must have your cameras. You can stop by later and pick them up at the police station down the street, but for now, I must keep them.”

  This pronouncement had taken on, at last, a commanding tone. Elder Thomas began to pull his camera out, but Elder Mecham said, “I thought you told us there was no law against taking pictures.”

  Elder Thomas took hold of his companion’s arm again, gripped it tight.

  “You are right about that, Mr. Mecham.” He smiled, showing his teeth for the first time—brown and blunt. “But your pictures might be helpful. We can study them and perhaps determine who started the fire.”

  “We got here too late to see who did it,” Elder Mecham said, “but I can guess.” He pulled his arm forward, trying to loosen Elder Thomas’s hold.

  The agent’s voice was suddenly stern. “I suppose I do not guess so well as you, sir. I must look at all the information I can obtain. Please now, your cameras.”

  Elder Mecham hesitated, but Elder Thomas gave his own camera over, and then
he took Elder Mecham’s from him and handed it to the agent.

  “You may call at the police station tomorrow. Tell the policemen there that Agent Kellerman told you to pick up your cameras. There will be no problem.” He glanced at the cameras. “German made, I see.” He smiled again, seeming to enjoy some irony that was lost on Elder Thomas.

  Again the elders turned to leave.

  “Ach, excuse me. One other matter. Do you write letters to your parents in America?”

  “Ja,” Elder Thomas answered.

  “When you write this time, tell them not to believe the lies the American press tells about Germany. Tell them we had an unfortunate fire here, and we kept your cameras because we are trying so very hard to find out who started it. Will you tell them that?”

  “We’ll tell them the truth,” Elder Mecham said. “That’s what we believe in.” He was leaning forward a little, using his height and weight to communicate more than his words. Elder Thomas tried again to pull him back.

  Kellerman didn’t back off. He said, firmly, “Don’t make a mistake, Mr. Mecham. I have comrades close by.”

  “I’m sure you do. You wouldn’t dare take someone on by yourself.”

  Elder Thomas suddenly stepped forward and slid his shoulder in front of Elder Mecham. “Sir, we stopped by to see what was burning. That’s all. We’re sorry we took pictures, but you have our cameras. We’ll be more careful in the future.”

  “That is right. You will be much more careful,” Kellerman said. He was looking at Elder Mecham. “I know your names. I’ll soon know your address. I wouldn’t make another mistake.”

  “Don’t worry. We want no trouble. We’re missionaries. That’s our only interest in being here.”

  “You are foreigners. That’s what you are. And we don’t need your kind. We don’t need you to teach us religion.”

  Elder Thomas was angry, but he only said, “We’ll go now.”

  “Heil Hitler,” Kellerman said forcefully, and he threw up his hand in a quick Nazi salute.

  “Auf Wiedersehen,” Elder Thomas said, slowly and emphatically. Then he turned to Elder Mecham. “Let’s go,” he said in English. The elders turned and began to walk away.

  “Wait a moment,” Kellerman called. Elder Thomas looked back. “I said ‘Heil Hitler’ to you. What do you say to me?”

  Elder Thomas thought for a moment, but he knew he had no choice. “Heil Hitler,” he said, flatly, obediently, but with obvious distaste.

  “And you?” Kellerman was looking at Elder Mecham.

  Elder Mecham also took his time, and then he said, “I’m not going to say that.” He held his ground, staring down at Kellerman.

  “Oh, Mr. Mecham, you make a great mistake. You will say it. Perhaps not now. But trust me, you will say it. You may even beg me for the chance.”

  For a moment, Elder Thomas thought of trying to say something to soften the confrontation, to smooth things over. But there was really nothing to say, and so he merely pulled on his companion’s arm and once again said, “Let’s go.”

  The missionaries walked away. But behind them, they heard Kellerman say, “You have not seen me for the last time.”

  Elder Thomas’s anger was already gone, replaced by fear. At the corner he glanced back, and he saw Kellerman still watching. Another Gestapo agent was now at his side.

  “I wish I could get that guy out in our back pasture,” Elder Mecham muttered. “I’d clean his plow.”

  “He was daring us to try something, Elder. Couldn’t you see that?”

  “Sure I could. So let him put up or shut up. He can use that big stick of his. I’ll still take him on.”

  “You have no idea what a stupid idea that is, Elder. Gestapo agents can do anything they want to do. He could kill you, right here in the street, and not have to explain his reasons to anyone beyond Heinrich Himmler.”

  “Hey, you didn’t say ‘Heil Hitler’ the first time. You got it all started.”

  “I know that. I lost my temper. It was stupid of me.”

  “Everything is stupid around here, if you ask me. What kind of country is this—where you can’t even take a picture?”

  “Be quiet! Keep your voice down.”

  “And you have to whisper all the time.”

  Elder Thomas gave up. He kept walking fast and glancing back to see whether anyone was following. He couldn’t believe what he had done. President Wood had warned the missionaries dozens of times about things like this. It wouldn’t take that much, he had told them, for one elder to get the whole Church in trouble—and get all the missionaries thrown out.

  Once the elders got back to their apartment, Elder Thomas said, “We won’t go out again tonight. I have branch work to do. And a talk to prepare. You can study.”

  Elder Thomas was the branch president in Maintal, a little town a few kilometers outside the city. The elders did most of their tracting in Frankfurt, but much of their time was spent looking after the members in the branch. They rode their bikes out along the river to Maintal three or four times a week.

  Elder Thomas sat down at his desk and tried to work on his talk, but he couldn’t concentrate. He kept wondering what Kellerman might do. And he wondered what more might happen in the city before the day ended. Time and again, he got up and walked to the window. And whenever he returned to his desk, Elder Mecham would soon get up and take a look himself.

  After an hour or so, Elder Thomas broke his own edict, and the two walked downstairs and bought wurst at a nearby Metzgerei, and milk and cheese and yogurt at a little dairy depot next door. They had no refrigeration in their apartment, so they had to shop almost every day.

  As the missionaries ate their cold cuts, they said very little. The horizon was darkening now, the sky faintly orange behind the buildings. If something more were going to happen, it might come after dark. Elder Thomas couldn’t help thinking that if a fire started in the ghetto, it could spread through the neighborhood and reach the apartment building the elders lived in. It was a scary thought, and so he didn’t bring it up, but it had to be something that Elder Mecham had thought of too.

  Elder Mecham had become quiet. He was animated when he was feeling all right, his hands constantly waving in the

  air or running through his chaotic brown hair, but sometimes he looked terribly lost. He had told Elder Thomas once, “I’m not ever going to learn this language. It just doesn’t fit my mouth.” And Elder Thomas knew what he was really saying: “I shouldn’t have come. I’m not suited for this kind of work.”

  Elder Mecham was not only tall, he was also twice as dense as Elder Thomas in the chest and arms. He had grown up on a big dry farm near Downey, Idaho, and had always worked hard. He had played football at the “AC”—the Agricultural College in Logan, Utah. Nothing in his life, however, had

  prepared him to spend his days in a suit, knocking on doors, politely offering pamphlets to skeptical Germans. His overcoat, cut big to fit his shoulders, looked like a two-man tent, and with his hat on, he seemed seven feet tall. When the Hausfrauen opened their doors to him, they often stepped back, cowering in his presence.

  “Do you think the Jews are catching it today—all over Germany?” Elder Mecham asked.

  “I would think so. But that Kellerman guy was lying. All this is coming straight from Hitler.”

  “I don’t see why the Germans put up with that little twerp.”

  “Most people like what he’s doing. Germans almost starved after the World War, and now they’re working and eating. A lot of our Church members speak well of him.”

  “I don’t think they’re saying what they really think. They’re scared of the SS and all these Gestapo agents.”

  “Maybe some of them are. But you need to learn some fear yourself. If Kellerman shows up again, you’ll have to say what he wants to hear.”

  “I don’t worry about that guy. He’s all talk. He had his chance to arrest us, and he let us walk away.”

  “You made him look bad, Mit. He can�
�t let that go. A guy like that has to save face. I’m scared of what he might do.”

  Elder Mecham shrugged, but Elder Thomas saw he was more worried than he wanted to let on. It crossed Elder Thomas’s mind that he ought to call the mission president and ask for transfers for both of them. But that was the last thing he wanted. He loved Frankfurt, and especially Maintal, and he was excited about a family named Stoltz that he and his companion had started to teach. He told himself that he could make things right with Kellerman if he had to.

  After eating, the elders tried again to settle down and study, but both were restless. As it turned out, however, they didn’t have long to wait. The trouble began suddenly, soon after dark. It started with shouts, then a crashing noise. Both missionaries bolted for the window.

  They could see little, but the noise was terrifying. The yelling was incessant: the shouts of men—forceful and commanding—and then, after a time, shrill screams of women and children and frightened men. And all the while, the breaking of glass, the crashing of heavy objects. The ghetto seemed to be shattering into pieces.

  The two elders stood stiff and tense, afraid they might soon see fires. But nothing burned. Only the sounds continued. And then headlights approached and engines roared. At the same time, Elder Thomas heard added voices. “More troops,” he said. “Probably Storm Troopers.” What followed were increased cries, increased confusion, and neither elder had to say it. They knew that people were being hauled away.

  Eventually the missionaries walked away from the window. They sat on their beds. But they didn’t study, didn’t even talk much. They listened as the sounds continued, on and on: trucks coming and going; the constant shouting; and still, the crashing sounds of things breaking apart.

  Neither elder slept much that night. It was the next morning before they ventured out to peer down the narrow Judengasse. A few people were trying to clean up the mess, but the refuse was everywhere: feather beds split open and strewn in the street, splintered furniture, smashed clocks, shattered mirrors. And everywhere, broken windows.

  A change had come. The Nazis had taken their gloves off, had come out into the open more than ever before.