by Shmuel David
Then we parked the car and Mother took out the basket, spread a beautiful cloth on the grass, and we had a picnic. Pauli and I went to look for berries and butterflies. When we came back, we saw Father sitting with his back against a tree, and Mother lying on her back with her head resting on his knees.
Pauli stole some of my photos of the Red Star Belgrade players. I have photos of all the players. I have a notebook with newspaper clippings about all the team’s games. Father once took me and Pauli to see them play against Dinamo Zagreb at our Beograd stadium. Milošević scored a goal with a massive kick, and the crowd all stood up, screaming, “Hyda Milošević! Hyda Beograd!”
After the game, Father invited all the players to our house for a bottle of slivovitz. But he told me and Pauli to take Lord out for a walk because he’d been inside the house all day. I got really mad at Father for not letting us be at the victory celebration, but he still refused. I wanted Milošević to sign his photo for me. We were dressed in the team uniform Father bought us, red and white shirts with the team’s logo in black and yellow. Father took a photo of me wearing the uniform, with a soccer ball under my foot, just like a real player. Father takes photographs all the time. He walks around the house with a camera hanging around his neck and keeps telling us to pose and smile for the camera, then the flash lights up the room. Mother complains he’s getting on her nerves with his constant photography. The whole house is full of photos, especially of Klarie with her blond curls. Father always boasts about how beautiful Klarie is. I once heard him tell Mother that sometimes he thinks Klarie doesn’t belong to our family, because Pauli and I have thick, black hair.
Every summer, Father invites Simon, the barber, to our house to shave our heads. Simon is a funny man. He wears suspenders to hold up his pants so they won’t fall off his fat belly. Mother calls the suspenders shleikes. He also has a funny little mustache. He always reminds me of the fat cat from the Mickey Mouse cartoons who wants to catch Mickey, though he never does.
It always makes me laugh when he arrives, opens his black bag, and takes out the haircut instruments in that funny way of his. There are all sorts of scissors and colored combs in his large black bag. The razor is the most dangerous instrument. It’s a folding knife, and it’s very sharp.
One day, he came and started with his funny movements. He took a kind of gray sleeve, wore it over his arm, and said he had a surprise in his bag. Then he took a black instrument from his bag. It looked a little like the flashlight Father bought Pauli last year. Simon waved it in the air and announced, “Surprise! Surprise!”
Pauli and I looked at him as if he were a magician. Next, he took a long, black electrical cord from his bag and looked for an electrical socket. When he plugged the instrument into the wall-socket and pressed a button, we heard a loud buzzing sound. Simon told us the machine shaved hair quickly and evenly all over the head. It was his first day with the machine. Simon promised it wouldn’t hurt; on the contrary, it would even be pleasant. So I volunteered to be first, even though Pauli is normally first. I could tell that Pauli was a little afraid of the machine. He even tried to open the main door connecting the garden with the living room so he could escape, but changed his mind and stayed to see Simon removing all the hair from my head with just a few movements. I wasn’t afraid at all. My head even felt nice, and I sat quietly, till suddenly, I saw Lord running across the path into the garden and trampling all of Mother’s flowers on the way. He was chasing the ginger cat that belongs to our neighbor, the angry Mr. Pops, who hates everyone.
I wanted to save the cat, because I knew if Mr. Pops thought Lord had hurt his cat, something really bad would happen. So I immediately jumped up from my chair with the blue apron still tied around my neck. The chair fell over on Mr. Simon’s foot, and I heard him yell out in pain. I ran, shouting at Lord, who had meanwhile knocked over the round tea table with the white cloth that Sophie, the maid, had set just a few minutes before for afternoon tea. All the cups fell on the patio floor with a big noise, and the cat managed to climb on a very tall branch. Simon was very frightened by what had happened and shouted for me to come back. He explained the danger and how fortunate it was that he was using the shaving machine and not the razor. He didn’t even want to think about what might have happened if it had been the razor. Meanwhile, Mother heard the commotion as well and came outside in a panic. She was also very angry when she had heard from Simon about my dangerous stunt. She told me to go to my room, because at five o’clock, Mr. César, my French teacher, was coming, and I’d better be prepared for the lesson, or else…
I just don’t understand why it’s so important for a child in second grade to learn both French and German, in addition to Serbo-Croatian, which is our principal language at school. But Mother thinks that the world of German literature and poetry is so rich that a cultured man simply can’t live in the world today without knowing German. She once taught me German herself, and we used to read aloud poems by Goethe and Heine. She loved listening to me reading aloud, but now she’s too busy. She has too many things to take care of in the house, most importantly the five o’clock tea with her reading-club friends. Mother is very active in the club. Once a month, she organizes a big literary evening at our house and invites lots of people. Everyone comes dressed very elegantly, the men with broad hats and the women in long dresses.
Mother always plays some sad piece by Schubert in honor of such a serious occasion. She won’t let me and Pauli stay up and makes us to go to bed so we won’t get under her feet. She calls me “my little spy,” because I love eavesdropping on adults’ conversations. When she thinks I’m already asleep, I go down very quietly and stand behind the staircase post; sometimes, I even go down the stairs and listen to their conversations. If I hear someone coming, I quickly run upstairs and hide under the blanket in my room. Most times, someone reads a poem, and Mother accompanies him on the piano. Then everyone talks about it.
Sometimes, they talk about what’s going on in the world, and then it gets really interesting. Last time, they spoke about the Zeppelin that reached the North Pole and everyone got excited, except my father, who declared he wasn’t surprised at all, then he spoke about the German Zeppelins again, about how, when he served in the Kaiser’s army during the Great War, the Germans used their Zeppelins to discover whether the enemy was approaching their ships.
Father once brought me an American stamp with a Zeppelin for my collection and explained how it worked. He showed me a photo of a Zeppelin hovering above skyscrapers, the tallest towers in New York. It’s a very big city, even bigger than Budapest in Hungary. Father travels to Budapest sometimes because of his work, and comes back after a day or two. The name, Zeppelin, made me laugh. Father explained it was named after a German count, Ferdinand von Zeppelin, who invented it, but he wasn’t the first one to come up with the idea. There was someone else who planned a model of it before him, a Croatian called David Schwarz. I thought it would have been even funnier if that puffed-up airship had been called a Schwarz, or perhaps “Zeppelium,” because of the gas that makes it lighter than air.
That night, I dreamed I was sitting in a Zeppelin, holding a wheel, just like the one in Father’s car. I was flying the Zeppelin to the North Pole. In the morning, I told Mother about the dream and that I’d like very much to see a real Zeppelin rising into the air. Perhaps Father could take me to Germany to see a real Zeppelin going sky-high? And Mother said, “You’ve been listening to adults’ conversations again. Instead of getting a proper night’s sleep, you’re running around, listening to adult matters. I can tell by your eyes you haven’t slept enough. You must sleep at night, otherwise you won’t grow properly.”
I also like listening to Father’s stories about the Great War. He told us about the bridges and railroads he’d built over rivers and valleys so the army could cross over. Other times, he had to do the exact opposite, destroy enemy bridges to make it more difficult for them to advance. When Klarie
was a little girl and the war started, Father was an engineering officer in the Kaiser’s army, and he fought for the Hungarian side.
On the living room wall, behind the piano, there’s a large photo of father. In the photo, he’s sitting in a chair, wearing a hat that looks like an upturned flowerpot with two red stripes at the top. He’s wearing high boots and a very long sword. He has a mustache, and his expression is very serious. Klarie told me that when she was five, Mother took her to visit Father in the trenches. Father put her on his horse and then left her on a cot next to his tent while he and Mother went to one side and kissed. Klarie showed me a photo Father had taken of her on a horse that day. She was wearing a wool hat pulled down over her ears, because they were freezing from the cold.
When I asked Father about Klarie’s photo on the horse, he answered, as always, that I ask too many questions. He doesn’t like talking about that time, the time of the Great War, and only says war is a terrible thing and we must never allow it to happen again.
Father wants me to be an engineer, too, when I grow up, but my history teacher told him I’m his best pupil, and he believes I’ll be a great researcher or writer when I grow up. Mother was very pleased to hear that, but Father told her it would be better for me to be good at arithmetic and geometry, like him as a boy, because engineers make a lot more money than writers. Mother was mad at him and said that lately he was only interested in work and money, and that he no longer took an interest in her literary evenings, that he used to read books and love poetry just like she does. Suddenly, she saw me standing at the door, listening.
“Little spy,” she said, frowning. “Is it polite to eavesdrop on adults’ conversation? Off you go and do your homework.”
Instead of going to my room, I went to visit Lord. I missed him. I lay next to him in the corner of the patio and stroked his head from his ears to his nose. I whispered to him that he was my best friend, and that he should keep me safe and I’d protect him from the neighbor, Mr. Pops. He hates dogs and has already told father that if he ever catches Lord in his yard again, he’ll kill him.
***
Exhausted, Alan stopped reading, despite his fascination. His curiosity and desire to discover who Inge was urged him to keep looking at the photos. He was hoping to find a photo of a girl his father had met in Belgrade, in the youth movement perhaps, or at summer camp, or one of Klarie’s friends who used to come for a swim in their pool, as he once told him. Three photos seemed worthy of further examination. Two of them were taken by the pool. In each, Klarie appeared with a different friend. The third photo was of a curly-headed teenager with beautiful eyes and a sad expression. She wore a long skirt and a plaid vest and held a bag in her hand. Could that be Inge? She appeared older than Klarie and her friends from the other photos, which made him wonder if she even belonged there. He placed the photos in his inner jacket pocket. Tomorrow, if his father was clearheaded, he could ask him about the girls in the photos.
The following day, when he returned from the hospital, he took out the envelope with the photos once again, finding a postcard photograph of the entire family: the two boys, Pauli and Hanne, their parents behind them, all wearing the one-piece swimsuits of the time, with shoulder straps and bathing caps. They all seemed very happy.
On the back was written “Summer vacation in Opatija, August 1931.” Then he turned his attention back to the diary he’d discovered the previous day and continued to read with increasing interest.
June 1933
Today, Mother suggested I do my homework early, because Mrs. Garai was coming for tea with her daughter, Branka. I quickly finished my calculus and geography homework. I’m really bored with calculus but love geography. Today, we learned about South American Indians and Aztec temples. I was so excited that I went to the school library during recess to look for a book about the Aztecs.
Branka has golden curls and sad eyes; she’s even shyer than me. Last time she visited, we barely spoke to each other. It was only when her mother was standing at the door that she started talking to me. She’s a year older than me, but already talks about grown-up things and told me she’s learning to play the piano and had even been to a real concert. I told her we’d be going to a summer house in Opatija, by the sea. But she told me she hated the sea and didn’t like swimming.
When they arrived, I invited Branka to come and see how Lord was, because today, when I got back from school, he didn’t run to me as usual, but just lay in the shade. He panted a lot, and his nose was all dry. Father told me a healthy dog’s nose should be wet. I brought him some water, but he hardly even drank. It turns out Branka doesn’t like dogs. She doesn’t even like the two cats in her own house.
I don’t understand people who don’t like dogs. Even though Lord is a dog, I feel so close to him, as if he were a real member of the family. I spend more time with him than I do with Pauli.
I thought that if she doesn’t like swimming, she probably wouldn’t want to get into my swimming pool either, so I suggested showing her my stamp collection, especially the new stamps, the ones Father had brought me from Mexico and Guatemala. I told her about the rainforest in Brazil and the Aztecs and the Maya people the Spanish discovered during the sixteenth century, but she was still bored. So I told her about our last train trip to visit Father’s aunt in Budapest and about the long tunnels under the mountains and how you suddenly go inside them and hear a great noise and everything turns dark and you can’t see anything for over fifteen minutes.
Branka told me they don’t have any family in Budapest, but that she’s been studying ballet for two years with a very famous teacher in Belgrade, and she wants to be as famous as Anna Pavlova when she grows up.
Then Mother called us to join them and asked Branka to play the piece she’d performed at her end-of-year concert at the conservatory.
Branka obeyed, confidently going over to the piano and pulling up the chair; Mother brought her a cushion to sit on.
“I’ve just told Louisa about your concert. She asked me if you could play one of the pieces,” said Mrs. Garai.
It was a movement from Schubert’s piano sonata that Mother especially likes. Branka played perfectly, and Mother wiped away tears of emotion. When she stopped playing, they both clapped their hands. I felt lost and embarrassed.
Mother and Mrs. Garai discussed the latest news—the burning of books written by Jewish authors at the Bebelplatz square in Berlin.
“Ever since that fire in the Reichstag at the beginning of the year, Jews and communists are being blamed for everything under the sun,” Mother said.
“I’ve heard that Hitler on the radio. He just won’t stop screaming. It sounds awful. Leo, my husband, says that ever since the Nuremberg Laws they’ve become a dictatorship.”
“But burning books? That’s simply barbaric. I’ve heard that books by Jewish authors were burned in Munich and other cities as well. It’s simply terrible.”
“I can’t even imagine where all this is leading,” said Mrs. Garai.
“Heine already said over a hundred years ago that ‘where they burn books, they will ultimately burn people as well.’ It is a powerful prophecy. If I were living in Germany, I would start packing.”
“It’s not so simple to just get up and leave your home. You have to leave your friends, language, and culture as well. Another advanced culture like the one in Germany isn’t so easy to find.”
“You’ll get no argument about that from me,” said Mother. “As far as culture, literature, and music go, Austria and Germany are unparalleled.”
Then they rose to leave, and Branka asked me if I’d enjoyed her playing. I said I had, but I didn’t really, and I don’t like her either.
1935
These are the last days of the summer vacation, and I’m already missing school. Pauli says I’m a freak of nature. He’s never heard of a child who misses school. The school year starts in a week, and I�
�ll be going into fifth grade. Father says I should play more sports and that there’s nothing like tennis or swimming. A good school report card is important, said Father, but it’s not enough. A teenager like me should be more athletic. He promised to train me, but after a while he no longer had the time and suggested that Klarie do it. She’s more patient with me, anyway.
Today, when I got back home, I noticed something was wrong as soon as I saw Mother.
“They’ve taken Uncle Albert away,” she said, choked with tears.
I couldn’t understand who had taken whom, or what she meant by saying someone had taken him. Did criminals come to his house and kidnap him for money? Albert is Mother’s elder brother. He lives in Munich and is very rich. Henrick, his son, had visited us during the last summer vacation, an annoying kid who thinks the whole world belongs to him. He cried every time he lost at table tennis or came last in swimming races.
“Who took him, Mother? Where did they take him?”
She gave me a sad look and said, “To Dachau. They’re imprisoning all the Jews in Dachau now.”
I remembered what Father had told me—that perhaps we should all leave and go to Israel, become farmers and sit under our vines and fig trees instead of hearing about new decrees every day.
“Could they take Father away one day, just like they’ve taken Uncle Albert?” I asked.
“No. They’ll never get here. There’s no Nazi Party here and there won’t ever be one,” said Mother confidently. Maybe she was just trying to reassure me.
Klarie promised to take me to play tennis again that day. My game has really improved lately. At first, I didn’t even know how to hold the tennis racket. But after playing with Klarie a couple of times, I was already able to pass the ball and improved my serve. Klarie is an excellent player and has already won several championships.