by Alex Amit
“Just a memory.” I must not show weakness, they will expel me.
“What do you prepare for Passover soup?”
“Kneidlach.”
“How do you make them?”
And I explain how Mom would get matzah flour and eggs and oil, when it was still possible, and add a little salt, and how the whole kitchen would be filled with their smell when they were cooked in hot water. I used to taste some of them from the strainer basket, and Mom would pretend she was angry at me, but not really. Where had the police taken them?
He then lets me read prayers from a small prayer book he holds in his hand, examines whether I can read the Hebrew prayers, and I read every page he opens to him, until finally he turns his back to me and walks over to Philip, who stands aside, leaning on one of the machines, watching me all this time as I’ve been tested.
“I believe her, but she’s too young.”
“I’m nineteen years old.” I turn my gaze to Philip, looking straight at him.
“She doesn’t look nineteen to me.”
“I just look younger.”
“She will not succeed, it’s too dangerous.”
“I will succeed.”
The tall man looks at me with anger for my interrupting his words, but Philip continues to look at me with interest.
My eyes are fixed on the wheels of the machine that keep turning, while Philip and the tall man turn their backs to me again and argue. What else can I say that will change their minds? I have run out of other options, I depend on their mercy.
“Maybe we can help you.”
I want to hug him, or fall at his feet and kiss them, but I’m afraid that tomorrow he will change his mind and I’ll find myself alone again, and I just look down and say nothing.
“In the coming days we will contact you and see how we can help you.” He ends the conversation between us and returns to the printing machine.
“Come with me.” The big man with the dirty shirt is waiting for me, but for a moment I stand still, looking at Philip’s back and the gun in his belt, wondering if I can trust him, even a little bit.
On the way back to town, blindfolded in the trunk of the bouncing van, along with crates of chickens, I sing to myself the Shabbat songs we used to sing as we sat together around the table, letting the tears come and soak in the black blindfold, and when we lie down to sleep in the apartment, I whisper “Good night” to the big man, feeling a little more secure and a little more protected.
“Filthy Jew.”
The scream that is heard in the room is mine, as I am thrown from the bed to the floor, and a hand grabs my hair tightly and drags me to the wall, forcibly pinning me to the peeling yellow cracks. I scream again, trying to wake up and figure out where I am.
“Where is he?” the man throwing me against the wall shouts in German, his hand resting on my neck and strangling me. I can barely breathe.
“Who are you looking for?” I answer him in tears.
“Where is the man who lives here?” And his hand tightens around my neck and I gargle words and try to breathe. My eyes search the room for the big man who will protect me, but to my horror, I notice a soldier in a green grey uniform and a round helmet standing by the closed door, holding a gun in his hand.
The hand that close on my throat releases me a bit and his evil face come close to me, stinking of tobacco.
“Where is he?” he yells at me.
“I do not know where he is,” I bitterly weep. Where is the big man? What happened when I slept? Why is he not here to help me?
“You liar,” he slaps me in the face, and I scream. “We saw you together, you are a member of the resistance with him, where is he?” He slaps me again.
“I’m not in the resistance.” I cry, feeling the pain of the slap. Who betrayed me? Did Philip with the gun in his belt betray me? Why did he do this to me? I can’t take it anymore.
“You’re lying, you are a filthy lying Jew, they saw you praying, where is he?”
“I do not know where he is.” My words barely come out against his tight hand and the tears blur my vision, where is the man? I don’t want to die.
“Last chance, where is he?” His awful hand grips my hair tightly and I scream again as he lowers me to the floor, my head almost hits the wooden floor.
“Please, I don’t know.” I look at his brown shoes and the hem of his coat, see my tears wetting the parquet in small circles and hold my breath for a kick to come.
“You don’t know where he is?”
“I’m just a French girl, please.”
“Last chance, where is he?”
“I do not know, please.”
“Kill her.” His whisper is heard to the soldier who is standing in the doorway and I breathe quickly, hear his footsteps approaching and see the tips of his black army boots. My eyes close as I feel the cold barrel touch my head and wait for the black to arrive. Maybe it’s better that way, to stop this awful place I’m in, it hurts so much.
Silence,
And the silence goes on,
And the hand that grabbed my hair and nape slowly lets go and releases me,
And the gun barrel is no longer touching my head.
And I hear footsteps and a door opens, and slowly I open my eyes, still seeing the old parquet floor of the apartment, which the morning sun paints in a light shade of brown. The little circles of my tears are still visible, but the black soldier’s shoes are gone and the brown shoes of the man who hit me are gone too. I do not dare to look up, knowing that they are still in the room and having fun, playing with the Jewish girl before the final execution.
“It’s OK, drink now.” A huge hand rests on the back of my head and even though I flinch in fear, he does not hurt me. And a simple glass of wine is served to my lips and I take small sips, doing what I am told, trying to get used to the bitter taste which is combined with the sour smell of cabbage.
“It’s OK, it’s over, you were OK.” And I look up and see the soldier next to the horrible man in the coat, standing at the door and looking at me, but they no longer look at me in hatred. The big man’s hand supports me, keeping me from collapsing on the floor, as he hugs me and hold the glass of wine to my mouth. “Drink, let the breath come back.”
Later on he walks over and confides in them, as they look at me placing the glass of wine on the floor, looking down and staring at the rays of the sun that penetrate the wine and create small waves of cheerful burgundy on the floor, as if it does not care what happened here minutes before. And when I raise my head and look at the door, the terrible people have gone, and the door is closed. I haven’t even heard the sound of it slamming shut.
The big man gets me up from the floor and supports me, lifts the kitchen chair that was turned upside down when they dragged me by my hair from the bed and slammed my body against the wall. He arranges it in place and sits me down.
After he makes sure I’m fine and I’m not going to fall on the floor again, he gently touches my shoulders for encouragement and turns his back on me. His hands take the loaf of bread out of the paper bag in the kitchen and start slicing it.
Two slices of bread on a plate, smeared with butter and a bit of strawberry-flavored jam, bitter in my mouth with the taste of my tears, a slice of yellow cheese, a glass of sweetened milk, and two cubes of chocolate substitute.
“Why did you let them?” The pain is clear in my voice, I feel unsafe in this place.
“We had to.”
“Who is ‘we’?”
“They will explain it to you in the evening.”
“What will happen to me in the evening?” Will they play at killing me again? The lump of cheese sticks in my throat.
“In the evening we go again.”
“To the same place?” The place where they don’t want me? To the man who told me he was sorry? To the same road? With the checkpoint of the German soldiers, who didn’t open the trunk of the van just because you are so big? What if this time there will be other soldier
s? Will I die in the evening instead of dying in the morning? And if I tell you what I heard; will you cancel the ride? And then I’ll walk the streets until they catch me? It’s hard for me to swallow the sweet slice of bread.
“You’ll know in the evening where you are going, it does not matter.” Maybe it really does not matter, it’s just a matter of time before someone catches me and kills me.
“Do not open for anyone and wait for me in the evening,” he tells me after the meal ends in silence, and he clears the dishes and gets ready to go. I do not want to be left alone.
After I hear the door slam, I go to clean up and scrub myself. Will anyone come in and surprise me?
The knife is within reach of my hand as I clean myself, even as I peek into the street through the open curtain, jealous of the young girl walking without fear, even when I hear footsteps in the stairwell. I come close to the door and try to listen. All day the knife is in my hand and I’m ready for anything, with the pear and the two slices of bread in my dress pocket. I’m ready all the time.
“We have to go.”
Since this morning I have been afraid of these words, knowing they will come at the end of the day. My thoughts are constantly on the German soldiers that will stop us on the way, and the questions I will hear through the thin wall of the trunk. Will they believe him?
“Go inside and sit.” The trunk door closes behind me, imprisoning me again, blindfolded. My hands stabilize myself for sitting. It’s too late for second thoughts.
The pungent smell of gasoline of the engine carries in the air, as the van goes down the stone road, shaking me inside the cramped trunk. I must think of something nice, like pre-war summer and vanilla ice cream. I must not think about ice cream, I just need to relax and breathe quietly, stop listening to all the noise outside, breathe and count for myself. Why did the van stop?
His big hand leads me slowly down the stairs, and the smell of print rises in my nose, even though I cannot hear the sounds of yesterday’s machines.
“You’re back.”
His fingers gently remove the blindfold, placing it in my hand. The gun is still stuck in his belt and he is close to me, looking into my eyes which are again trying to adapt to the burst of light of the yellow ceiling lamp.
“Yes, I’m back.”
“Are you fine?”
“Yes, I’m fine.” Your people have done terrible things to me.
“Do you want to know why we did it?”
“No, it’s OK.” Because you, like them, want to see if you can trust the Jewish girl or accuse her in treason. We are always suspicious of something.
“How old are you?”
“Nineteen years old.”
“You are not nineteen, how old are you?”
“Seventeen years old.”
“Why did you lie to me?”
“Because I want to reach the age of nineteen.”
Philip silently looks at me, as if thinking what to do with the Jewish girl standing in front of him, and I stare back.
“We had to make sure you were not a Gestapo agent, one who would betray us all.”
“I had a father and mother and Jacob that the Germans took. Do you still think I’m a Gestapo agent?”
“You’ll have to learn to be more polite, and don’t lie to me anymore.” He turns and walks to the table at the end of the room. “Come here.”
I sit down in front of him on the wooden chair. My hands are under my thighs, feeling the roughness of the wood, but close to the knife hidden in the dress pocket, along with the pear and the two slices of bread.
“You have two options,” Philip leans towards me and looks into my eyes, putting his hands on the table as if he wants to show me that his intentions are good. I stare at the color print stains on his fingers.
“First option, we can take you back to Paris, you will go your own way, you’ll probably try to get to the south on your own and maybe you’ll succeed in crossing the border into Spain. With all my heart I’d wish you good luck. I will also give you some food.”
“And the other option?”
“You will join us.”
“Which means?”
“Everything we need.”
“And who are you?”
“We are the fighters for free France.”
“Will I die?”
“Maybe, maybe I will die too, life is given to those who are willing to fight for it.”
“I want to live.”
“I cannot guarantee you that.”
I can feel the metal touch of the knife in my pocket. I am tired of running by myself, living from minute to minute in such fear.
“What would I do for you?”
“You will bring us information about the Germans.”
“I’m scared of them; they will kill me.”
“They’ll probably kill us all.”
“I’m Jewish.”
“You’ll have to forget who you are, you’ll become someone else.”
“I hate who I am.”
“Good.”
Philip smiles a little at me, for the first time since noticing me last night, and turns around and calls out to the tall man, who is leaning over his stamping table, busy with his work and ignoring us. The stamp man delays for a moment while concentrating on some document, then he takes a cardboard box off the shelf above him and takes out a camera.
“Come over here, stand by the white wall. I need to photograph you for a fake ID.”
As I get up from the chair and try to digest what I have chosen, I turn to look at the front door of the basement, searching for the big man who brought me here, wanting to thank him for saving my life. But he is not here anymore.
II
A New Life
May 1943
Telegram II
Secret
5/3/1943
From: Western Front Wehrmacht Command
To: 34 Corps Paris
Reorganization, Regulation 53
Purpose: Paris Area is Declared a recovery home base for German army troops.
General: The remaining divisions of Rommel’s African Corps are retreating from North Africa, under pressure from American and British forces.
The number of casualties in battles against the Russian army on the Eastern Front is steadily rising.
Therefore, Paris will be declared a recovery home base for German army troops.
Method: Regulation 53 will replace Regulation 15.
German soldiers throughout the Paris area will be allowed to purchase goods at local stores. Local Army Headquarters will select and approve stores according to their needs.
Food rations: Issuance of food ration certificates for the selected stores is the responsibility of Logistics Division 221.
SS. Telegram 821
Paris, May 1943
“ID, please.”
My fingers pull the ID out of my leather bag, and I hand it to him, watching as he examines it carefully. He is taking his time, checking all the details and stamps, reviewing the picture and comparing it to my face while looking at me.
“Name?”
“Monique.” Philip insisted I not change my name, so I would not be confused when I got nervous.
“Last name?”
“Otin.”
“Date of birth?”
“December 14, 1925.”
“How do you know German so well?”
“I grew up in Strasbourg.”
“That’s German territory today, why are you in Paris and not with us in Germany?”
“Dad had a lumber business, and Mom was a teacher, and I grew up there, but in 1937 Dad wanted to grow the business, and we moved to Dunkirk.”
“Why Dunkirk?”
“It will not work. They will never believe me.” My eyes look at Philip, sitting on the other side of the wooden table, examining me with a serious look.
“Don’t stop; keep answering me.”
“They will check and find that I’m lying, and kill me.”
&nb
sp; “They cannot check; thanks to the American bombers, they have nowhere to check. Strasbourg City Hall was bombed during an American raid a year ago. They tried to hit the railways and missed, destroying City Hall. What did you do in Dunkirk?”
“We were in Dunkirk until May 1940 when the Germans invaded.”
“You can’t recite your story; you must fill it with emotion. There will be a German investigator sitting in front of you, not me, you must speak emotionally. You must imagine that I am that German soldier who hates you.”
“We lived in Dunkirk until three years ago, May 1940, when you invaded France and Belgium.” Most of the time, I think he hates me.
“And what happened then?”
“They will not believe Dunkirk, why not somewhere else?”
“Because the German guns destroyed Dunkirk, not a single piece of paper was left there. Go on talking, how did you get to Paris? Do you want the German to believe you? Where are your emotions?”
“When the German army broke through the lines of defense, Dad decided we had to escape, they woke me early in the morning. When I got out of the house, the car was already fully loaded, everything Mom and Dad could pack in a hurry. We tried to escape to the south, but on the way, they were killed.”
“What happened?”
“A plane. On May 23, one of your airplanes killed them.”
“Watch your tone here; you are speaking about the German army.”
“Sorry, I apologize.”
“How did it happen?”
“A German Stuka passed by and fired at the convoy of refugees we were in, just like that.” And I close my eyes and imagine the story, getting the words out slowly and emotionally.
“We’d been on the roads for two days by then, strolling down a narrow road full of cars and people and horses with carriages. The cars’ roofs were loaded with mattresses and suitcases tied with ropes. The horses walked so slowly, and the air was constantly filled with the smell of fear.”
