Isaac's Beacon

by David L. Robbins

  Vince asked, “Where to?”

  “Town.”

  The destruction of Weimar was not complete. Hugo and Vince drove past intact homes and businesses, yards fletched with tulips and flowering shrubbery, bright laundry on sagging lines. In bombed lots, gardeners under sunhats troweled in the dirt. Bicyclists avoided craters in the road, children chased a dog across a field of bare chimneys. A church and steeple were somehow untouched. Perhaps if the war had gone another month, this place would be more ruined.

  In the sunny late morning, Hugo guided Vince to the town center. The reporter drove carefully; he and the Army vehicle were the only American presence in sight. Townspeople walked or biked; there was no gas for vehicles, and the horses could no longer be fed so they’d been eaten. The car’s noise drew attention as they rolled into the market square.

  “Stop here.”

  Vince pulled up to a fountain. The marble pool was dry, a naked Neptune at its center ruined by shrapnel. In February, an air raid had obliterated half the square; camp guards had ferried Hugo and a hundred others here every day for a month to sift through the carnage, salvage what remained, and dig graves.

  The U.S. Army had torn down all of Weimar’s swastika banners, chased out the last fighters, and killed who they had to. The townsfolk in the square kept their distance from Vince and Hugo. Young women walked without young men, the elderly picked through the debris for bits they could use. In the ruins, people chipped mortar from bricks, then stacked them neatly for the rebuilding of Germany.

  Hugo peeled off the army jacket. “Stay in the car.”

  He climbed out in his striped prisoner’s clothing. A woman walking a child pivoted to take a different path across the square.

  Hugo walked a lap around the fountain, then widened his orbit. He strolled past the centuries-old Rathaus town hall, empty shops with shuttered windows, a field of rubble where an apothecary once stood. A nurse on a bicycle rang her bell for him to get out of the way. Old men in vests and ladies in clean dresses halted to let him go by. Schoolgirls were unable to hide their distaste.

  Hugo circled back to the car. He gestured to the pistol at Vince’s waist. “Is that loaded?”

  “It is.”

  “Do you know how to use it?”

  “What are you going to do?”

  Hugo unbuttoned his coat to show his ribs. His gut was shrunken, a sinkhole. He advanced on the people, lurched into their paths, shook the coat as if emptying himself, made them sidestep or turn away. Women covered their mouths and the children’s eyes, men froze to stare. Hugo tired and returned to the car.

  Vince drove out of the square. He waited until they were well away from the bomb damage and into the fields on the outskirts of town to ask, “What was that?”

  Hugo laughed at the question. “Come now. Do you have to ask?”

  Chapter 9

  Vince

  Hugo said no more in the rolling jeep. The little man leaned back his shaved head and closed his eyes to the sun and wind. Vince couldn’t read a mind like his, couldn’t make guesses after what Hugo had lived through, but imagined he was simply returning to life.

  Five kilometers outside Weimar on the shoulder of the road, a dozen inmates in prisoners’ garb walked in a tight ring. None of them were as thin as Hugo.

  Hugo said, “Stop the car.”

  Vince halted. The inmates paid no mind. The young man they surrounded wore a brown civilian suit.

  “I recognize him,” Hugo said. “He’s one of the camp guards. They must have found him hiding. Follow them.”

  Vince crept the jeep behind the walkers. The prisoners kept close ranks around their quarry, who made no attempt to bolt. They traveled a kilometer in this formation, ignoring the jeep inching along behind.

  The road led past an abandoned farmhouse. The gang of inmates and their prisoner entered the yard.

  “Pull over.”

  Vince stopped. Hugo stepped out and without a word slid into the midst of the inmates. Together, they moved beneath a great oak just beginning to bud.

  Two of the inmates disappeared into a barn. They rummaged about until they emerged; one rolled a wooden cask, the other carried a coil of rope. Beneath the old tree, they set the barrel upright and lay the rope on top.

  With Hugo, the inmates made a circle around the guard and the tree. One old inmate moved into the center. He’d rolled up his striped sleeves as if there was work to do, but he touched nothing, only spoke to the captured young man. The guard listened wide-eyed, then lifted the rope off the cask. The old man who’d whispered to him faded back into the ring.

  Another stepped forward. Like the first, he spoke low. The guard was a fair-skinned young man, hair cropped short to leave a mop of cornsilk yellow on the crown. His clothes ill-fit him, plainly borrowed or stolen. He faced the inmates, scared and compliant, eyes fixed on whomever was speaking. He nodded like a schoolboy. The inmate, a swarthy man, made guiding gestures with a finger, instructions.

  The guard fashioned the rope as he was told. He made a loop, then took wraps around it. In his quivering hands, it took on the shape of a noose.

  Vince did not need his pencil or notebook. Here was nothing he would forget.

  Once the rope had thirteen turns and was a proper hangman’s tool, another inmate moved into the circle. He directed the guard to toss the noose over a branch two meters above his head. Another stepped forward to have him to tie the loose end of the rope around the tree trunk. The guard’s movements looked automatic, not his own. Two more inmates strode forth, to hold the cask while the guard climbed up on it where the circlet of rope dangled in front of his face. The guard went stock still, a statue of a young deserter on a pedestal.

  Hugo moved into the center of the ring. Peering up at the guard, he spoke quietly. The youth shook his head once. Hugo spoke again, the boy nodded. He slipped the noose around his neck, then pulled it snug.

  Hugo spoke again. The guard stepped off the barrel. Hugo retreated to avoid being kicked. The guard tried wildly to grab the rope above him but failed, swinging harder. His heels struck the side of the barrel, he took one crazed shot at getting back on top of it but kicked it over. He choked out croaks until his mad arms and legs faded to twitches. When his fingers lost their clutch, he swung and the branch creaked. Vince turned for the car and waited for Hugo.

  Vince drove off the instant he climbed in.

  “You killed him.”

  “Did we?”

  “You know damn well you did.”

  “What did we touch? Did we throw the rope over the tree? Tie the noose? Kick out the barrel?”

  “That’s fucking clever.”

  “Perhaps. It was many things.”

  Vince drove until they’d gone beneath the camp’s tower and black sign. He parked near the main gate, left the key in the ignition, and climbed out. No one paid notice; the camp swarmed with the same activity it had an hour ago.

  Hugo strode close to Vince, to speak evenly, the way he had to the guard.

  “You killed him, too, you know.”

  “I did not.”

  “You have a gun. You’re in uniform. You could have stopped it. You didn’t. Why not? Was it for the story you’ll write about it?”

  Hugo patted him on the arm. “It’s alright. You didn’t come to Germany to be a murderer.”

  “I’m not.”

  “Of course not. That Nazi boy hanged himself by his own hand. You’re innocent. So are we. That’s what the sophists among us will tell ourselves. May I ask a question?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “I’m not setting traps for you.”

  “What.”

  “Why do you think that guard stepped off that barrel? What do you think I said to him?”

  “I can’t imagine.”

  “I told him he could walk away if he wanted.
We wouldn’t stop him. But one day he would hang, and he knew it. Either he’d do it in a thousand nightmares until he hanged himself in some basement. Or the Allies would catch him and do it for him. I asked him to kill himself where we could see him. If some day he slipped a noose around his own neck in private or he was executed in a prison yard, it would be a waste. Doing it in front of us was his one chance.”

  “Chance at what?”

  “To do something that mattered. Something of note.”

  “This is crazy.”

  “Is it? I asked if he hated us. He said he did not. I told him that was a shame. If he hated the Jews, then at least what he’d done in the camps would have been some work of accomplishment. If he didn’t hate us, then everything he’d done, every crime, had been the act of a stupid mindless follower. His life had meant nothing. But, I told him, he still had a chance at significance.”

  “How?”

  “He could do what we did. At first, when the Nazis came for us, we fell back into our magnitude, our millions across Europe. We mattered for our works, our art and money and influence. Our covenant with God. All very important, yes? Then in the end, when we were proven wrong, we took solace in our victimization. We went to the pits and chimneys indignantly and bravely. We did it believing to the last that the only noble act left was to die wronged, to cast our blood on those who did this to us. Our only way to be avenged was to brand the Nazis our killers. That is what I told the guard. If the Allies strung him up, he’d die as he lived, a drone. If he committed suicide alone, he’d be just a murderer and a coward. But if the Jews hanged him, well then, you see, we’d be damned as his killers. He’d be dead, which was inevitable, but we would bear the shame and crime of his death. Hanging at our hands was the only act of meaning he had left. In this way, he was no different from a Jew.”

  Again, Hugo patted Vince’s arm.

  “Except he was wrong, of course. We didn’t hang him.” Hugo returned Vince his pencil. “Write this down.”

  Once Vince pulled out his notebook, Hugo stuck a chalky fingertip onto the blank page.

  “My past. Record it and take it. I have no need for it anymore.”

  Vince scribbled.

  “I was a plumber in Leipzig. I had a mother, father, and a sister, all teachers. One night the truck came for me. Just for me. I told my family to go from Leipzig. But where, they asked? I had no more time. At the train station, I stole a pair of pliers from a toolbox. With three hundred others I was shackled into a cattle car. Leaving Leipzig, I pried off my leg chains. I pulled down a board from the wall. The others begged me to leave the pliers behind so they could free themselves, but I needed them to take off my own handcuffs. Every minute was another kilometer from the city. I leaped into the night. I forced open my manacles and made my way to my home. It took me a week of hiding. When I got back to the city my family was gone.”

  “Do you know what happened to them?”

  “I found a neighbor I could trust. He told me they’d been sent to the Riga ghetto.”

  “Do you think they’re alright?”

  “No. I do not. After two more days, I was captured. The Nazis deported me east to Treblinka. I survived there for three years. Only a few did. I was the Nazis’ plumber, you see. When the Russians began to close in, I was transported to Buchenwald, where I survived again.”

  “What are you going to do now?”

  “You saw the people in Weimar. The hatred. Mine for them. I can’t stay in Germany.”

  “Where will you go?”

  Hugo trickled knotty fingers over his striped coat. “Many will want to become Americans.”

  “Probably.”

  “I won’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “In America I’d be a plumber. At the moment it’s my only skill. But I’m through with it. I was a plumber for the Nazis. I want other significance.”

  “What else will you do?”

  “It doesn’t matter. So long as I’m safe.”

  “You’d be safe in the U.S.”

  “I can’t have my safety in someone else’s hands. My own particular terror demands that it be in my own. What do you know about Palestine?”

  “They’re trying to make a new nation. It’s a violent place.”

  “Birth is often that way.”

  “Are you going?”

  “I believe I will. And I believe you should come with me.”

  Vince couldn’t go to Palestine. He’d promised the newspaper he’d be away only a few months. He was close to having what he needed for a series of articles on the last stages of the war and the liberation of Buchenwald. He could stay overseas only a few more weeks.

  “I can’t.”

  “You can’t? I see. And what of the things I can’t do? I cannot go home. Keep solid food in my fucking stomach. Speak with my family. Please make me a list of what you can’t do.”

  Hugo retreated on his disintegrating shoes. Before he’d gotten out of earshot, he stopped.

  “Here is the point, Vincenz Haas, where you have two paths. Remain the American reporter and watch me walk away. Spend a few more days in Buchenwald, then write your newspaper articles. Whatever that says about you, it says. Or have faith that I will live a new and purposeful life in Palestine. Come with me and see. You may even live one of your own.”

  Hugo strolled off.

  Chapter 10

  Rivkah

  June 30

  Kibbutz Kfar Etzion

  Palestine

  The barn door let in a morning breeze that stirred the smells of manure and straw. All the kibbutz’s eight Baladi cows stamped, urging to be milked. On her stool, Rivkah set a bucket beneath the first one.

  An unexpected boy entered the barn. He stood on the fresh chaff holding a red hen to his chest.

  “Hello,” Rivkah said in English.

  This was Shmuel, one of ten orphan teens who’d arrived in Kfar Etzion last week from Hungary. Shmuel nodded to Rivkah. He hadn’t learned Hebrew or English yet, and was not a German speaker.

  “What are you doing here?”

  Shmuel stood stiffly, confused. The chicken clucked in his arms.

  “Why do you have a chicken?” Rivkah mimicked his hold on the bird.

  Another boy and three girls strolled in. Each wore khaki pants and a white work shirt. They took positions flanking Shmuel and his chicken, gazing at Rivkah for instruction. One girl broke ranks to pet the flank of a cow; the animal stamped a hoof.

  Rivkah had no idea why the children were in the barn. She continued milking the impatient cows. The teens took turns stroking Shmuel’s chicken.

  Five more youths entered, all in khakis. Mrs. Pappel arrived, shooing more young ones ahead of her with the backs of her hands.

  “Go, go, go.”

  Four cows struck hooves on the straw; with so many people in the barn, each believed it should be milked next.

  Mrs. Pappel wasted no time seating the children in a semicircle. She wore a sleeveless denim smock, one long grey braided ponytail hung down her back like a whip. Her tanned arms resembled a farmer’s.

  Rivkah asked, “What are you doing?”

  “Can you stop milking and come over here, please?”

  “No. Why?”

  “I’m teaching class in the barn this morning. I want you to join us.”

  Mrs. Pappel had never taught in the barn. Rivkah stood in curiosity; the milking could wait, though the cows were used to their schedule. The children sat cross-legged in a circle around Mrs. Pappel.

  Rivkah asked, “Why does Shmuel have a chicken?”

  “It reminds him of his father. The man was a butcher in Budapest. Leave it alone. Sit.”

  “I don’t need to study English. I live with you.”

  Mrs. Pappel pointed at the straw. “Sit.”

  Rivkah too
k a spot in the semicircle. The cows mooed for her return.

  Mrs. Pappel began by having the class sing a traditional English ditty, “Dig a Ditch and Go Whoo!” Shmuel’s chicken remained serene. Mrs. Pappel pointed out many things in the barn, putting them into sentences, making the children repeat. The cows eat grass. We drink milk. The straw smells nice. Rivkah chanted along with the ten orphans. The girls eyed her admiringly.

  With pantomimes and silly faces, Mrs. Pappel drew laughter and English from the young teens. Rivkah clapped with them during the lesson.

  A knock came on the open door of the dairy barn.

  Five British soldiers filled the broad doorway. Under the rafters strode a craggy officer; he removed his khaki cap. Mrs. Pappel stepped toward him. Rivkah rose.

  “Ladies.”

  Mrs. Pappel tilted her head without losing her smile. “May I help you?”

  “You speak English.”

  “I do. I am teaching it to these children. And you are interrupting my class.”

  “I beg pardon. My purpose can be disposed of quickly enough.”

  “I’m sure. It is?”

  “We’re looking for illegal Haganah weapons.”

  “In our kibbutz?”

  “Everywhere, madam.”

  “Are you looking in the Arab villages, too? I see Arabs carrying guns everywhere.”

  “I’m not a politician, madam. I have no say in that.”

  “Does that make it proper?”

  “It makes it my job.”

  “You want to look in my classroom?”

  “I wish to look in this barn. I didn’t know it was a classroom.”

  “As I said, with respect, you are disturbing my class. And your guns are scaring my students.”

  “Where are these children from?”

  “Hungary.”

  “Then I’m sure they’ve seen guns. Why does that boy have a chicken?”

  “Even our pets have jobs. This one lays eggs.”

  The officer eyed the barn, the seated teenagers, the standing Baladis, Rivkah’s full pail, and another half-empty. The cows lowed in complaint.