by Lily Brett
“I have not been brought about by indigestion or an acid stomach,”
Höss said.
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“Why can’t you leave me alone?” said Ruth.
“I do not cause you any pain,” Höss said. “I do not hurt you. I do not disturb you.”
“That’s a joke,” Ruth said. “I find you very disturbing. Can’t you go away? I’ve had a long day.”
“I know this,” Höss said.
“I wouldn’t have gone out on my own if I’d known you were going to appear,” Ruth said.
“You do not have to be alone,” said Höss. “I can speak to you anywhere.”
Ruth looked around her. No one had appeared to notice that she was talking to herself. There were not many people in the café. It was still early.
Surely, even in Lódz, this café would fill up soon. It was Saturday night.
She hadn’t told Edek that she was going to go out. He had looked so tired. And he had asked her several times if she was going to go straight to bed. He seemed to need to know where she was. She had told the hotel operator to call her in the café if Edek called her room. She had known that she wouldn’t be able to sleep. She knew she had to try to unwind. Cafés usually relaxed her. She could drift off and daydream. She had also needed to see some sign of life in Lódz.
A young woman in an evening gown was playing a selection from My Fair Lady on a piano, just beside the refrigerated selection of cakes. The café had the white crocheted lace curtains of a country inn across the windows and elaborate plastic chandeliers above each table. Ruth had been admiring the lack of restraint in the decor when Höss had broken up her thoughts.
“Do you not find this interesting, Miss Rothwax?” Höss said. Ruth started. She had forgotten that he knew her name. She wasn’t sure why this should startle her. It certainly wasn’t more startling than the fact of his presence. Or his presence in her life, to be more precise.
“Don’t I find what interesting?” she said.
“The fact of so many of our names beginning with the letter ‘H,’ ”
Höss said.
“No, I don’t find it interesting,” Ruth said. “There are so many of you, so many Nazis, that you could look up any letter of the alphabet and find many major Nazi figures.”
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“So many Hs. What does it mean?” Höss said.
“A better question would be why so many Nazis?” Ruth said. “So many members of the party, so many vociferous supporters, and so many silent followers and informal friends? So many dependents and adherents and appendages. So many flunkies.”
“I know this word ‘flunky,’ ” Höss said.
“A person of slavish or fawning obedience,” Ruth said.
“I am familiar with the term,” said Höss. He coughed uncomfortably.
Was he coughing in discomfort at the thought of himself as a flunky?
Ruth thought. She shook her head. She couldn’t believe she was thinking about Rudolf Höss’s thoughts. The thoughts of a dead, long-departed, former tiller of the soil, former agriculturist, and Nazi.
“Himmler, that skinny little failed chicken farmer, looked like a flunky,”
Höss said. “But he was not. His pedantic mannerisms and excessively courtly manners made him look like a flunky. A humble flunky. Or are all flunkies, by necessity, humble?”
“I’m not sure,” Ruth said. “You could possibly have an arrogant flunky.
Is this skinny chicken farmer you are referring to Heinrich Himmler, Reichsführer-SS?”
“Failed, skinny little chicken farmer,” Höss said. “He had a diploma of agriculture. He was a salesman for a firm of fertilizer manufacturers before he went into the poultry farming business.”
“Like you, he was the son of a very pious and authoritarian Catholic father, wasn’t he?” Ruth said.
“What has this got to do with anything?” Höss said.
“I don’t know,” said Ruth.
“Himmler was not discouraged by his failure to farm chickens,” Höss said. “The fact that his chickens failed to breed did not dishearten or dis-may him. He did not see this failure as an obstacle to tackling human genetics. It was Himmler who established Lebensborn. You know what Lebensborn is?”
“Sure,” said Ruth. “It was the program for the creation of a pure Aryan life. Lebensborn. Spring of life. You had good terminology, you Nazis.
Spring of life. And its twin, Lebensraum living space.”
“Thank you,” said Höss. “Himmler was a first-class organizer and administrator, I must admit. He took a subject of limited interest like
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racism and turned it into an organizational tool with which to build up Germany. It became essential, if you were a patriotic German, to understand the good that can become of racism.”
“They had to hate everyone else in order to preserve themselves,” Ruth said.
“Very succinct,” said Höss. “The state-registered human stud farm that Himmler set up was a necessity. We had to breed greater numbers of pure Germans. Himmler passed a procreation order on October 28, 1939, to the entire SS. Soldiers had a moral duty to procreate with German women and girls of good blood. Soldiers came from everywhere to couple with the German girls that were selected for the breeding. I must say that they chose the young women very well. They all looked Nordic.” Höss sounded excited at his recollection of the obligation to procreate with German girls of good blood. Ruth felt nauseated.
“Himmler set up Dachau in 1933. It was the first concentration camp,”
Höss said. “You know this?”
“I know that,” said Ruth.
“Himmler studied the inmates of Dachau,” Höss said. “In 1937—in January, as a matter of fact—he gave a speech. ‘There is no more living proof of heredity and racial laws than in a concentration camp. You find there hydrocephalics, squinters, deformed individuals, semi-Jews. A considerable number of inferior people!’ Himmler said. It was quite a good speech.”
Ruth said nothing. She wasn’t feeling well.
“Himmler was always described as a man without nerves,” Höss said.
“They said he was unemotional. Yet he nearly fainted at the sight of a hundred Jews who were executed for his benefit on the Russian front. What sort of strength does that show? He should have eliminated himself from his own breeding program,” Höss laughed.
“Himmler suffered from a lot of psychosomatic illnesses,” Ruth said.
“He had severe headaches and terrible intestinal spasms.”
“This is true,” said Höss. “Himmler was also fanatical about homeopathy, herbal remedies, and health food.”
“I’m not interested in homeopathy or herbal remedies,” Ruth said.
“You drink herbal tea,” said Höss.
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“How do you know that?” she said. “Don’t bother to answer,” she said.
“I couldn’t care less.”
“I was living on the land when Himmler’s call to join the ranks of the active SS came,” said Höss. “Three of our children had already been born ready to be part of the bright future we were planning. It was June 1934. I am normally very decisive, but it took me a long time to make my decision about joining the SS. In the end the temptation to be a soldier again was too strong. It was stronger than the doubts that my wife voiced. My wife was concerned about whether the profession of being a soldier would give me total fulfillment and self-satisfaction.”
“Well, she was wrong, wasn’t she?” Ruth said.
Höss overlooked her remark. “Today I very much regret that I abandoned my former life as a farmer,” he said. “It was not a road to wealth and riches, so today I would be equally without a home and other material possessions of my own.”
“What do you mean without a home of your own?” Ruth said.
“I thought nobody owned property where you are?”
“I am speaking of time in a general way,” Höss said.
“Well, it confuses me,” said Ruth.
“See how interested you are,” Höss said.
“Don’t flatter yourself,” she said. “I am not that interested.”
“You are interested,” Höss said. “It is your destiny.”
“You think that it is my inevitable fate that I have to have this contact with you?” Ruth said. “A predetermined course of events? I don’t think so.”
“You and I have a connection and we cannot escape that,” Höss said.
“You would be the master of imprisonment,” Ruth said, “so you must know something about escape.”
“I know how to make escape impossible, that is true,” Höss said.
“I can easily escape,” Ruth said. She stood up, turned, and dug her heel into the floor. Höss howled in pain.
“Shall I continue?” Höss said after a couple of minutes.
“It’s very polite of you to ask,” she said. “Okay, continue.”
“I was talking about destiny,” he said. “Who among us can see the complicated course of a man’s destiny?” Ruth settled back into the chair, in the café. This sounded like a long story. “When I read Himmler’s invitation to
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join the ranks of the SS, I took no notice of the fact that the unit I would be joining would be guarding a concentration camp. The whole notion of a concentration camp was foreign to me. To me it was merely a question of being once more an active soldier. I went to Dachau.
“I remember the first flogging that I was a witness to very clearly. Two prisoners who had stolen cigarettes from the canteen were sentenced to twenty-five strokes of the lash. This was 1934. June 1934, you understand, and Dachau was not yet a death camp.”
“ ‘Death camp,’ that’s very straightforward language for you to use,”
Ruth said.
“There is no need for sarcasm,” said Höss.
“Of course I know Dachau wasn’t quite the death factory then that it turned out to be,” Ruth said. “They dispensed with lashes pretty promptly once they had expanded their notion of camps and death. They dropped all the detours. They went straight to death.”
“I do not need you to display your knowledge on this subject,” Höss said. “I was in the middle of telling you the reaction that I had to my first flogging.”
“I’m sure it was remarkable,” said Ruth. Höss appeared to overlook her sarcasm. He was obviously impatient to get on with the story.
“The first prisoner made no sound,” Höss said. “He was a small man, a petty criminal. The other prisoner, a big, physically strong politician, cried out and tried to break free at the very first stroke. He screamed loudly throughout the lashings. When this prisoner began to scream, I felt myself shudder. I became very hot and then very cold.
“Later on, I witnessed my first execution. But the execution did not have nearly such a big impact on me as the lashings.”
“In June 1936, Himmler and Bormann visited Dachau,” said Höss.
“They recommended me for a promotion.”
“Congratulations,” Ruth said.
“Bormann was the head of Hitler’s chancellery,” Höss said.
“I know,” said Ruth.
“I was transferred to Sachsenhausen in May 1938,” Höss said.
“I’m glad we’re moving through the story,” said Ruth. “I’m tired. Do you mind if I order something to eat?”
“Why should I mind?” said Höss. “I have to watch people eating the T O O M A N Y M E N
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finest-quality food, in Himmel, while I myself in Zweites Himmel’s Lager have to make do with food not fit for human consumption.”
“In that case I’ll order an apple strudel,” Ruth said.
She ordered a slice of strudel and a glass of chamomile tea with lemon.
The waitress was as offhand and rude to her as most waiters and waitresses in Poland were. Ruth thought this proved that she must look as normal as any other customer. She hadn’t unnerved the waitress. She must not appear to be talking to herself.
“I do not know why the Polish are rude,” Höss said. “I have always observed the habits and behaviors of people I have worked with, and the Poles are a harsh people.”
“Unlike the Germans,” she said.
“Exactly,” said Höss. “Quite unlike the Germans.”
“Germans are hardworking, too, aren’t they?” she said.
“Yes,” said Höss. “Quite unlike the Poles.” Ruth laughed. “You like to laugh at the Poles?” said Höss.
“Sometimes,” said Ruth.
“I have worked hard, all of my life,” said Höss. “I very much enjoyed hard work. I feel no satisfaction with myself unless I have done a good job.”
“Well, you definitely did a very good job,” Ruth said.
“Your strudel will be here soon,” said Höss.
“Good,” she said. “I need the sugar. I didn’t expect to be giving you a job appraisal.”
“I carried out my duties, in a scrupulous and conscientious manner,”
Höss said. “I had been a prisoner myself, do not forget. I was firm and sometimes severe, but I was sensitive to the needs of the prisoners. I had a deep concern about some of the things taking place in the camp. I was never indifferent to human suffering. But because it was not possible in my job for me to show any weakness I had to overlook these feelings. I should have gone to the Reichsführer-SS and explained to him that deep in my being I knew I was not really suited to concentration camp service. But I could not find the courage to do this. I had become too attached to the black uniform to relinquish it.”
Höss’s words soured the taste of her strudel. Ruth pushed the plate away. Höss sounded wistful at the memory of the black uniform he had been so attached to. He was quiet for a minute. “Of course with all the H
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names, the one that I am most confused with is Rudolf Hess,” Höss said, eventually. “It is extremely agitating for me to be confused with Hess. We are as distinctly different as two people could be. Hess was introverted and shy. He joined the army when he was twenty to escape from the domination of his father. As a matter of fact he was also in the Freikorps. However, any similarity between Rudolf Hess and myself, Rudolf Franz Ferdinand Höss, is shallow and superficial.”
“You both volunteered for the army, joined the Freikorps and then the Nazi party,” Ruth said. “That doesn’t sound so trivial or cursory a coincidence.”
“You know nothing,” Höss said. “In the early days, Hess was Hitler’s private secretary. He had a doglike devotion to Hitler that was most embarrassing to observe. He was not an intelligent man. Ha! What an understatement that is. Hess got where he got because of his blind hero worship, his ardor and fervor and fidelity to the Führer.”
“Weren’t you all like that?” Ruth said.
Höss cleared his throat. “We were loyal and faithful followers,” he said.
“But that quite disgusting Hess was slavish in his servility and subservience and reverence for Hitler. Hess was a secretary,” Höss said disdainfully. “He took down most of the dictation for Mein Kampf. Hess made only one original contribution. The concept of Lebensraum.”
“That’s quite a large contribution, isn’t it?” Ruth said.
“He gave a name to a concept that many of us Germans had been thinking about,” Höss said. “That is not such a big contribution. It was also Hess’s job to announce Hitler at mass meetings. His eyes used to open so wide when he made these announcements. He looked like a deranged zealot.”
“Didn’t you all?” said Ruth.
“Why are you interrupting me with these very annoying asides?” said Höss.
“I’m not really trying to annoy you,” Ruth said. “I’m just stating the obvious. Y
ou talk about Rudolf Hess and his pitiable pliability and alle-giance and ardor. It seems to me you were all like that.”
“He was stupid,” said Höss.
“Oh, that’s the difference,” she said. “I didn’t realize.”
“Hess described Hitler as ‘pure reason in human form,’ ” Höss said.
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“Even at the Nuremberg War Crimes trial, in 1946, Hess said, ‘It was granted me for many years to live and work under the greatest son whom my nation had brought forth.’ ”
“Sounds as though Hess was in love with Hitler,” Ruth said.
“Now you are being stupid,” said Höss. “Hess was so stupid. He ended his career with a most sensational act of stupidity. In May 1941 he parachuted into Scotland. He landed near to the home of a duke he had met just once. He hoped the duke would convince the British to overlook Hitler’s activities. He assured them that Hitler had no intention of destroy-ing Britain, a fellow Nordic nation. The British, of course, made him a prisoner of war. Hitler declared him deluded, deranged, and insane,” Höss laughed. It was a particularly unattractive laugh. A high-pitched squeal. A cross between a giggle and a snicker.
“Most of us major SS leaders did not ourselves look like the Aryan prototype,” he said. “Himmler looked like a diffident accountant, or a petty bureaucrat, and shy, insecure, nervous, stupid Hess was hardly the model Hitler had in mind to take over the world.”
Ruth felt tired. She should have stayed at home, she thought.
“You did not sleep well last night,” Höss said to her.
“No, I didn’t,” she said.
She had tossed and turned all night. She had had one of her recurring nightmares. The worst one, the one in which she was a mother. The children were nearly always babies. Every now and then, one of them was a toddler, able to walk. In these dreams she lost her babies or starved them.
She misplaced them. Left them on buses or trains. She left them in department stores and in parked cars. The abandonment in her dreams was never intentional. She simply forgot that she had given birth to and brought home a baby. When in her dreams she realized what she had done, she was mortified. Horrified at herself. In some of the dreams she had set up a beautiful nursery, then left the baby there, to die. In other dreams she couldn’t feed the baby. Her breasts would be dry or she would have run out of formula. Sometimes she had the breast milk and the formula but simply forgot to feed the baby.
