In My Hands: Memories of a Holocaust Rescuer

by Irene Gut Opdyke

  Rokita stole Fanka's family. But he did not steal Fanka. I swore he never would.

  That night I dreamed I was walking over autumn harvest lands that were heavy with wheat. It was a beautiful red-gold, the color of Mamusia's amber beads, and overhead was a sky so clear and blue that it was painful to behold. The dried wheat stalks whispered against my legs as I brushed past, and I looked down to see that the ripe and fruitful grains were scattering onto the dirt with a sound like a sigh. I bent to pick them, one by one, from the earth, and place them in my gathered apron, but even as I did, the wind stirred itself and began waving its hand over the fields, strewing the grain. As far as the horizon, the wind was casting the wheat aside, and I felt a wave of panic rise up in me. I picked faster, grabbing up spilled grain by the handful, my nails caked with mud and my loaded apron tugging at my waist until I thought it would drag me down and bury me in the dirt.

  Falling from My Hands

  The autumn progressed. In the laundry room, my new friends were gaining weight thanks to the food I had been smuggling them every day. They also began turning a wall of shelves into a false front, in case it ever became necessary to hide in the laundry room. As the weather turned cold, I began to worry about them, shivering in their thin summer clothes.

  “Herr Schulz,” I began one day as we were cleaning up from breakfast. I was busy scrubbing at some dried egg on a plate and did not look at him. “Wasn't it cold last night? I wonder if Janina and I could have extra blankets for our beds.”

  I glanced at him from the corner of my eye. He, too, was looking down at his work, and frowning slightly. Then he dried his hands and left the kitchen. I continued working, wondering what his abrupt and silent departure meant. He was ordinarily noisy and full of bustle.

  When he returned a few minutes later, he carried a tall stack of blankets in his arms—many more than just two extra blankets. “Irene, if you need anything—anything at all—you must not be afraid to ask me,” he said in a low voice.

  At once, my heart began hammering behind my ribs, and my face felt hot, as though I had been caught at something. He knew. Schulz knew what I was doing.

  “After all,” he continued in his usual cheerful tone, “I can't have my girls shivering now, can I? That would reduce our efficiency.”

  Confusing emotions chased one another through my heart. I was grateful, and I was relieved, and yet I was almost angry at Schulz for being so kind and for helping me help the Jews without admitting it—he made hating the Germans a complex matter, when it should have been such a straightforward one. Fighting tears, I smiled my thanks and took the blankets away.

  When I brought them to the laundry room, Ida and Fanka fell upon them at once, cutting them up to tailor into winter coats. I left them to their work, and found the first snowflakes of winter spiraling down from a dull gray sky as I crossed the compound again to the kitchen.

  Rokita now came to dine with Major Rügemer nearly every night. They often drank together in the private dining room after dessert, while some of the other officers played billiards in the recreation room. The air would be thick with cigarette smoke while I moved quietly from room to room, emptying ashtrays, taking away dirty glasses and empty bottles. I gathered whatever information I could to the accompaniment of clicking billiard balls.

  But as December began, there was little conversation about anything but the holiday party plans. The officers and secretaries discussed the upcoming celebration with the dedication of students planning a dance. Officially, the Nazi party was not Christian. They had no organized religion, unless you counted their fanatical veneration of Adolf Hitler. However, not everyone was a member of the Nazi party, and the enlisted Wehrmacht soldiers in particular were determined to continue their old Christmas traditions.

  The HKP party would include officers from all over the district; there would be a great deal of extra work, and Schulz warned me that everyone would have to help out with serving. So far, I had kept Janina from direct contact with the officers; I didn't want to bring my pretty young sister to their attention. But with the party as big as it would be, I knew I could not persuade Schulz to let me keep Janina off duty.

  In the kitchen, we were busy for days ahead of time, preparing cakes and sweets and other delicacies. Without the new workers I had brought from the Arbeitslager, Roman and Sozia, I could not have managed to do everything that had to be done. They were newlyweds, a young couple full of hope and dreams in spite of the despair that surrounded them. Sozia sang all the time, and Roman would gaze at her with such love that it hurt to watch them.

  At last, Christmas Eve arrived, and the hotel was filled to capacity with extra guests. Janina was almost giddy with excitement: We were going to a party, even if it was only as servants. She followed behind me, almost stepping on my heels, as we brought the first trays of hors d'oeuvres into the crowded dining room.

  The place was a roar of voices and laughter that nearly drowned the music from the phonograph. Every man was in his finest uniform, bristling with medals and insignia, and the secretaries were dressed in the latest fashions from Berlin. Janina gazed around her, her eyes sparkling. “Irenka, isn't it splendid?” she whispered.

  “Good evening, Fräulein Gut,” came a voice from behind me.

  I spun around to find Rokita ogling my sister.

  “Sturmbannführer,” I said, making a slight curtsy.

  Rokita could not take his eyes off Janina, who was blushing under his scrutiny. “Who is this lovely creature?” he demanded.

  Fear bolted through me and left my fingers prickling. I could feel a flush of anger between my shoulder blades.

  “She is my sister,” I said.

  Rokita shifted his gaze to me. “Don't tell me she's been here all this time and you've been hiding her.”

  I could hardly draw my breath. “Please excuse us, Sturmbannführer. We have work to do.”

  I took Janina's elbow and led her away through the crowd. “He's a very powerful and dangerous man,” I hissed. “It's not safe to have him interested in you.”

  “But he's so handsome,” my sister marveled.

  “Don't be an idiot, Janka. I've told you what he does. Next time you see him, look at his ring—that will show you his real face.”

  I shot a worried look back across the room. Rokita was whispering in the ear of a sluttish blond woman wearing a low-cut dress. As I watched, she reached up and stroked his cheek with one painted fingernail. I shuddered, and hustled Janina back into the kitchen.

  Roman and Sozia were busy washing and drying champagne glasses; Schulz was arranging slices of bread around a bowl of Russian caviar. “Irene, I ran into someone in the hallway a few minutes ago who wants to meet you,” Schulz said.

  I picked up another tray of hors d'oeuvres. “Me? Who could want to meet me?”

  “A local girl. She's here as Rokita's date. She heard I had a Polish girl as an assistant, and she thought it would be fun to meet you. Maybe she wants to be friendly.”

  “Probably she wants to show off that she's sleeping with the head of the SS,” I muttered, thinking of the vulgar-looking woman I had glimpsed with Rokita.

  The door opened, letting in a burst of noise from the party. The woman picked her way across the tiled floor in her high heels, beaming a smile toward me that was all teeth. “You must be Irene,” she began. “My name is Natasha. I heard that—”

  She broke off, gaping at Roman. He had backed up to the sink and was gripping it tightly, while Sozia sent a bewildered look from her husband to Natasha.

  “Roman,” the blond woman said in Polish. “So, I see they've put you to work in the kitchen.” She looked at Schulz and switched to German. “Don't you think it's risky to put these Jews to work in a kitchen where food for officers is prepared? I will tell Sturmbannführer Rokita about this at once.”

  Schulz took her by the arm and steered her back toward the dining room. “Verzeihen Sie, mir, Fräulein. We have so much work to do.”

  He hus
tled her out, but not before she shot one last cold look at Roman. We all stared at him in dismay. “Do you know her?” Janina asked.

  “I knew her before the war,” Roman said, drawing a shaky hand across his upper lip. “We were friends, but I suppose she wanted something else. She wanted—she was very jealous and tried to hurt me by spreading gossip and slanders. My family threatened to take her to court, and she swore she would get even with me.”

  Sozia put her arms around her husband and laid her head against his shoulder. “Don't worry, my love. We are already prisoners. She can't hurt us any worse.”

  And yet the very next day, on Christmas, they did not report for work. Herschl Morris's brother, Hermann, and his wife were brought instead. Roman and Sozia had been taken away.

  I wanted to scream when I heard the news. Beautiful Sozia with her black curls and her singing. Roman with his warm eyes. Natasha had carried out her revenge, and Rokita had been her instrument.

  I imagine it this way: Roman and Sozia had been dangling from the edge of a cliff, but I had been holding on to their wrists. I had been holding on, I swear to God I had been holding on!—but they slipped out of my grasp anyway, and when I closed my eyes, I saw their faces as if they were falling away from me into darkness. My head roared with the sound of their falling.

  I tried to pray, tried to remind myself of the promises that Jesus’ birth had made to the world, but when I closed my eyes to whisper my prayers, I saw only Sozia and Roman, falling away. Natasha's revenge made Christmas a lie.

  And Rokita, returning day after day to dine with Major Rügemer, kept asking about Janina. The major was a gentleman and knew what Rokita wanted. Rügemer— I think out of kindness to me—kept putting Rokita off. But Rokita was wily, pouring schnapps into the major's glass and urging him to drink. I shuddered to think what the major might agree to while drunk. Time was racing.

  Shortly after Christmas, I asked to speak to Major Rügemer in his office. He smiled when he saw me, and waved me to a seat.

  “Fräulein Gut, how may I help you?” he asked.

  “I want you to let my sister go back to Radom.”

  The major's eyes looked very large behind his thick glasses. “What are you saying?”

  “Herr Major, I think you know. Sturmbannführer Rokita is like a spider creeping toward a fly. I must protect my sister. Please send her back to Radom. She is so young,” I added, and in spite of myself, tears welled up in my eyes.

  “Now, now, Fräulein Gut,” the major said quickly. “Don't cry. Don't worry. I'll let her go.”

  “Oh, thank you—”

  “But, Irene,” he continued, “you must stay.”

  I felt a snag on my happiness. He had called me Irene. He was making a condition for Janina's release. Somehow, the light seemed to have changed, and I saw myself differently. I saw myself being watched by Major Rügemer. I nodded slowly, seeing myself in this new way, a way I did not like, but must accept. “Yes, Herr Major. I will stay until the end of the war.”

  When I saw Rokita that night, removing his heavy winter coat in the vestibule, he beckoned me forward with a jerk of his chin. “Your sister. I want her to wait on me tonight.”

  “I'm so sorry, Sturmbannführer. We have just discovered she has tuberculosis. We are sending her away. It's very contagious.”

  Rokita recoiled. He stared at me with something like disgust for a moment, then turned on his heel and entered the dining room without another word. He had stolen Roman and Sozia. But he would not get Janina.

  But now, as 1943 began, my last link with my family was gone.

  Puszcza Janówka

  I had one consolation: Helen Weinbaum had moved to a farm outside Ternopol. We crossed paths in town on a bitter cold day, and quickly brought each other up to date as we huddled in the shelter of a boarded-up bookstall. Helen had learned that her husband, Henry, was Rokita's valet! As a sophisticated, cultured young man, Henry was indispensable to someone like Rokita: He knew perfectly how a gentleman should dress and entertain. Henry tended bar at the parties Rokita had at his headquarters and, like me, sent word of Rokita's plans to the ghetto when he was able. Now Helen and I promised to keep in touch if we could manage it.

  It was impossible, at this time, not to know that the war was going badly for the Germans in the east. Since attacking Stalingrad in August, the Germans had been struggling without success to overwhelm the Russians. Stalin had decreed that the Red Army would not take another step backward, and the Germans and Russians had been fighting from building to building in Stalingrad for five months. The city was decimated, pounded to rubble by German shelling and scoured by blizzards howling up from the Black Sea, and still the Russians were not retreating. Thousands of German soldiers had been killed or captured. Our factory was on double shifts, speeding production of munitions until it seemed that the machinery would melt under its own heat. A Russian occupation would be no improvement for Poland, or for me personally. But for the sake of the Jews, I prayed nightly for the Russians to advance and crush Hitler's army.

  As if fearful that they would run out of time, the Nazis began speeding up their Aktions against the Jews in the spring of 1943. Rokita and his Sturmbann made forays to “thin” the ghetto and the Arbeitslager with increasing frequency.

  “Many people are choosing to hide in the puszcza,” Herschl Morris told me one day in the laundry room. “Better to live like wild beasts in the forest than wait for death in the ghetto. My brother and I have decided that we will go, too. We will take our wives and hide in the forest.”

  I was examining the hiding place they had built behind the wall of shelving, and I looked at Herschl with some surprise. “How will you live?”

  He smiled wryly. “As free men.”

  “Not free,” Steiner broke in with a sour face. “As hunted men.”

  “We'll take our chances in Puszcza Janówka,” Herschl insisted. He turned to me. “And Irene, you must help us to get there.”

  I looked from Herschl to his wife and back again. “Give me a few days,” I said, and then left the laundry room without further discussion.

  I did not ask myself, Should I do this? But, How will I do this? Every step of my childhood had brought me to this crossroad; I must take the right path, or I would no longer be myself. You must understand that I did not become a resistance fighter, a smuggler of Jews, a defier of the SS and the Nazis, all at once. One's first steps are always small: I had begun by hiding food under a fence. Now I was making plans to get a dorozka, a wagon, from the farm where Helen lived, and to transport in secret the Morris brothers and their wives ten kilometers from Ternopol, to the black-shadowed forest of Janówka.

  But even my first feeble efforts to help the Jews back in the Radom ghetto could have brought me a bullet in the head; I knew I could only be killed once, and, as the saying went, I might as well be hanged for a sheep as for a lamb. The Nazis did not distinguish between leaving food under a fence and smuggling four people in a dorozka, and so I did not, either. Even so, I was thankful that Janina was gone, because what I was planning now could have put her in mortal danger, too.

  I was now twenty-one years old, and I had been a fighter on and off for four years. Those four years should have been spent in school, or in falling in love and starting a family, or in working at a job, or in a hundred other ways. But that was not to be. For four years I had been in the middle of war, and I had different hopes and expectations now. I only wanted not to die in too much pain, and to foil the Germans as much as I could before I went.

  On a morning late in May, Helen arrived with the wagon. I had already secured permission from Schulz to take the day off, and the Morrises had committed themselves to hiding by the roadside overnight. I did not ask how they would escape the Arbeitslager; if they could do it, they would. I would be on the road with the wagon. This dorozka had been rented from the farm with vodka and cigarettes I stole from the supply room. Abrupt, telegraphic flashes of surprise sparked in my mind as I climbed u
p onto the driving seat: trading in stolen goods, smuggling runaway Jews. It was almost unbelievable that I was the one doing these things.

  I left Ternopol, going north toward the village of Janówka, begging the warm sun and the steady clop-clop of the horse's hooves to settle my nerves. I kept my gaze on the beast's bony rump moving in front of me, watching as the horse twitched at flies, tipping my ear to the whispery whisk of the long tail hairs which were flecked with bits of straw.

  A kilometer or so outside Ternopol, the road narrowed as it went through a stand of birch trees. I heard a whistle, and then someone called my name. I pulled back on the reins, halting the dorozka. Ahead of me the road stretched empty until it rounded the corner of a potato field. A look over my shoulder showed the way was clear behind me. There was nothing to see but the dust from my wheels drifting sideways in the sunlight. I nodded, and the four Morrises slipped through the trees, clambering quickly into the bed of the dorozka and hiding themselves under the load of hay and bags of potatoes without speaking.

  I clucked to the horse and we were off again. I had been stopped for less than a minute, and when I emerged from the copse of birch trees, no one could have known that the dorozka now had four new occupants. I breathed deeply, willing myself to stay relaxed and calm. After a while, the spire of a church came into view, and we were soon rolling through the tiny village of Janówka. Chickens and geese scurried out of the road, scolding as we passed. At the church, an old priest was bent over, tending a rosebush. He looked up at me and smiled kindly.

  I could not say why, but his smile gave me new courage. I turned my face back to the road, and it seemed that in no time, the dark edge of the forest came into view, like a curtain being pulled across a window. The road was silent but for the hiss of the rubber tires over the dirt and the clopping of the horse's hooves. I suspected that I was being watched; we all knew by now that Puszcza Janówka held more than foxes and wild boar. It was filled with fugitives and partisans, the war's outlaws. The Germans did not dare to go there in small patrols.