Too Many Men

by Lily Brett

  “That made you Inspector of Concentration Camps, didn’t it?” Ruth said.

  “Yes,” Höss said. He sighed. “I really would have preferred to go to the front,” he said. “But the Reichsführer had most firmly forbidden me to do this. Not once did he forbid me, but twice.”

  “Himmler thwarted you?” said Ruth.

  “The Reichsführer was doing what was best for the country,” Höss said.

  “I think it was definitely best for the prisoners that you left Auschwitz,” Ruth said. “Things improved, minimally, for the prisoners after you left.”

  Höss laughed. “Yes, I heard this,” he said. “They say things were never quite as harsh after I left.”

  “It was a minimal difference,” Ruth said. “But the most minuscule difference in Auschwitz could make a difference.”

  “I do not believe there was much difference,” Höss said. “Liebehen-schel, who replaced me, was a short man, a pudgy type. He had particularly protruding eyes. He was a weak type.”

  “Short? Pudgy? Protruding eyes?” Ruth said. “Where were all the Aryan prototypes?” Höss ignored her.

  “I was discussing my new job as Inspector of Concentration Camps,”

  Höss said. “In my new job, I was now able, thanks to the aid of an efficient office, to follow the development and progress of all of the concentration camps. I was able to obtain an overview, which was essential for us.”

  “You were like a time and motion expert, an efficiency expert,” Ruth said. “Your job was to make sure that the death camps were working at full capacity, with a healthy production line and maximum profits.”

  “That is correct,” said Höss. “It was quite a challenge. Maurer, the deputy director, and I were able to correct much of what was wrong. But by 1944, it was really too late to make extreme changes.”

  “What a shame,” Ruth said. “If you had been given another year on the job Europe could have been truly Judenrein. Free of Jews. There could have been not even one Jew left.”

  T O O M A N Y M E N

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  “I think so,” Höss said, quite matter-of-factly.

  “You had barely been in the job for a year when things began to decline for you, didn’t they?” Ruth said.

  “This is absolutely correct,” Höss said. “From the beginning of the intensified air offensive in 1944 not a single day passed without reports of casualties.”

  “The poor Germans,” Ruth said.

  “Yes,” said Höss. “These persistent air attacks placed great difficulty and stress on the civilian population. Especially on women.”

  “I nearly forgot your sensitivity to women,” Ruth said. “Were all Germans as sensitive about this as you were?”

  “No,” Höss said. He didn’t notice her sarcasm. He was too immersed in his recollections, Ruth realized. “Even Berliners, whose spirits are not so easily brought down, were in the end exhausted,” Höss said. “Worn out by the endlessness of the attacks. Having to spend days and nights in cellars and shelters, their nerves came under strain. The psychological torment suffered by the German people could not have gone on for much longer without severe psychological repercussions.”

  “You think it was too much for the Germans trying to dodge bombs in cellars and shelters?” Ruth said.

  “Yes,” said Höss. “Absolutely.”

  “It’s hard for me to feel sorry for them,” Ruth said. Höss didn’t say anything.

  “Our new jet fighters could not keep back the enemy,” Höss said. “The offensive continued and increased. Despite this the Führer gave orders to continue to hold firmly to our mission and our principles. Goebbels wrote about the necessity to believe in miracles and he made several speeches to that effect.”

  “They didn’t seem like desperate men to you?” Ruth said. “After all, you were being trounced.”

  “I had serious and grave misgivings about whether it was possible for us to win the war,” Höss said.

  “I should hope so,” Ruth said. “The war was nearly over.”

  “But I refused to let myself doubt our final victory,” Höss said.

  “Well, you knew you had won,” Ruth said. “You knew how many Jews you had gotten rid of, how many gypsies, how many others you didn’t

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  L I L Y B R E T T

  approve of you had murdered. You knew the world was already a different place. And it would never be the same. You knew you had definitely won.”

  “We had not yet won,” Höss said sternly. “Our mission was to be in power. To purify Europe and give the German people a world free of disease, and distrust. My heart stayed with the Führer and his ideals. I knew that we must not let these ideals perish.

  “I am certain that others had similar thoughts to my own. Thoughts that we might lose the war. But none of us dared to voice this possibility. Each of us worked with a grim dedication, as though if we as individuals worked as hard as possible we could achieve victory. We made sure that the prisoners who were working in our war factories that had not yet been destroyed, were kept working at full pitch. We shared the same attitude to those defeatists among us who said that our efforts no longer mattered. We dealt with them immediately.”

  “When you were getting rid of colleagues who were voicing doubts about a victory, you really knew it was all over. You knew the enemy was surrounding you. You knew it would all be over fairly soon,” Ruth said.

  “I knew that I had to do everything I could to support the Führer,”

  Höss said.

  “You drove to Auschwitz, didn’t you?” Ruth said. “You left your office, and you drove to Auschwitz. You were desperate to do whatever you could to cover your tracks, and the tracks of your fellow Nazis.”

  “Of course,” Höss said, with pride in his voice. “Of course. I hoped to reach Auschwitz in time to ensure that the orders to destroy everything in the camp were being correctly carried out.”

  “You didn’t want any evidence left behind, did you?” Ruth said. “Why?

  If you were so proud of your ideals, why were you worried about others uncovering your actions?”

  Höss snorted. “That is a stupid question,” he said. “Please do not interrupt me. I tried to get to Auschwitz but I was only able to get as far as the Oder River, quite close to Ratibor, because the Russians and their tanks were already spreading out in great numbers across the other side of the river.” He paused for a moment. “The scenes that I encountered on that chaotic journey will never leave me,” he said. “It was complete chaos everywhere. A chaos that was a result of the orders to evacuate all concentration camps.”

  T O O M A N Y M E N

  [ 4 7 7 ]

  “There were Nazis marching streams of half-dead Jews all over Poland and into parts of Germany and Czechoslovakia,” Ruth said.

  “Yes,” said Höss. “On every road, and even on tracks, I encountered columns and columns of prisoners. These miserable, wretched, abject prisoners were struggling to walk in snow that was often, particularly west of the Oder, very deep. They had no food.”

  “You noticed?” said Ruth. “The lack of food didn’t bother you in Auschwitz.”

  “I gave very strict orders to the men who were in charge of the columns of prisoners,” Höss said. “I told them in no uncertain terms and with the full status of the SS ranking, that they were not, under any circumstances, to shoot those prisoners who were not capable of marching farther.”

  “Really?” said Ruth. “Why would you bother to do that? They were helping you by shooting Jews. They were keeping up your good work. I don’t think Hitler or the Reichsführer would have approved of that attitude.”

  “In one instance,” Höss said, “just as I had stopped my car next to a dead body, I heard the sound of revolver shots very close to where I was. I ran in the direction of the shots and saw a soldier who was about to shoot a prisoner who had slumped against a tree.

  “The soldier had barely gotten off his motorcycle and al
ready had his revolver drawn. I called out quickly to this soldier. He ignored me. I shouted at him. ‘What on earth do you think you are doing?’ I shouted.

  ‘Has this prisoner caused you any harm?’ The soldier laughed out loud, at me. ‘What do you think you can do about it?’ the soldier said to me in the most impertinent manner.”

  “The soldier obviously didn’t know who he was dealing with,” Ruth said.

  “I drew my pistol and shot him with no further delay,” Höss said. “He was a sergeant major in the air force.” Höss breathed out heavily. Ruth could feel that he was still flushed. That he was still experiencing the adren-aline rush of that memory. That swift response with his pistol.

  “I know why you were trying to show some compassion, some concern for the prisoner,” Ruth said.

  “Why?” said Höss.

  “You were trying to save your neck,” Ruth said. “You knew it was about

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  L I L Y B R E T T

  to snap, about to break.” A gurgling noise, followed by a semisuppressed wet cough, came from Höss. Ruth flinched. It sounded disgusting. “It still hurts, doesn’t it?” she said to Höss. “The memory of the hanging. The memory of that pull on the neck. The memory of the snap. The memory of the fracture and the rupture.” She paused. “That was rupture, not rapture,” she said.

  Höss was quiet. Ruth thought she could hear him trying to swallow.

  “Really, Rudolf,” she said. She stopped, in surprise. She had never addressed Höss by his name. It felt strange. She looked around the cabin of the plane. No one was taking any notice of her. Edek was still asleep.

  “Really, Rudolf,” she said again. “I don’t see why you were bothering to appear concerned. It was a bit late in the day for you to be trying to save your neck. Do you know this expression, a ‘bit late in the day’?”

  Höss didn’t answer. “It doesn’t refer to the time of day,” Ruth said. “It refers to your life. It was too late for you. You had murdered too many. It was too late to defend a Jew. Too late to save a Jew. Too late to shoot a Nazi or an air force officer. Or any other German. It was just plain too late. You had murdered too many.”

  “When I saw this chaos on the road, at the end, I tried with all of my power, until the very end, to bring a sort of order to the madness,” Höss said. “But it was no use, nothing I could do could make any difference.

  And then we ourselves had to flee.”

  “There were people looking for you, weren’t there?” said Ruth. “You had to grab Hedwig and run.” Höss didn’t answer her. “You don’t want to talk about it, do you?” she said. “Okay, we can drop the subject.” She felt magnanimous. She was nearly in Lódz. They would be in Lódz briefly, and then she would be on her way home. Höss cleared his throat. Ruth wondered if he was clearing lingering fragments of the hanging out of his esophagus.

  “You will be angry with your father very soon,” Höss said.

  “I’ve been angry with him lots of times,” Ruth said. “Don’t try to sound like a prophet. I know you see yourself as a visionary, but your prophecies don’t frighten me. They don’t even faze me.” She thought Höss was probably not fooled by her air of bravado. But, really, what did he know? He was just an old Nazi. “What do you know, anyway?” she said to Höss. “You’re still stuck in Zweites Himmel’s Lager.”

  T O O M A N Y M E N

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  “I am not so stuck. I am going on a journey. Quite a journey,” Höss said, and he laughed. It was an eerie laugh. A weird laugh. More like a cackle or a hoarse screech. The laugh rang out. Ruth was sure that it could be heard throughout the plane. She looked at the stewardess, who was offering her some canapés—a pat of liverwurst on a rye biscuit. The stewardess didn’t look as though she was hearing anything abnormal. Ruth declined the canapés.

  She looked at Edek. He was snoring quietly. He looked peaceful. She wondered why she and Edek were going back to Lódz. What did Edek expect to find there? Something small. Why hadn’t he looked for it when they were there? Was it something he didn’t want to face? Something troubling? Something he thought he didn’t want? It couldn’t be anything essential. He had lived without it for fifty-two years. He had lived without even mentioning it.

  Edek could have asked her to look for it when she was in Lódz, fifteen years ago, if it had been that important to him, she thought. She sighed. She really didn’t have enough energy to muster up too much anxiety about the buried object. That’s what she did, she realized. She mustered up anxiety for herself. Conjured it up. Wished for it. Searched for it. Sought it out.

  And when the anxiety hit her, she was finally able to relax. To relax in the fear, the dread, the tension, and the sense of foreboding. It was all so familiar to her. The tension, the apprehension, the uneasiness. It put her in the same hemisphere as her mother. The same orbit. It put her in the world of those who suffer.

  “The bite on your face is still very enlarged,” Höss said.

  “It was a very large fly,” Ruth said.

  “I know,” said Höss.

  “I guess you do,” Ruth said.

  “By a very strange coincidence,” Höss said. “I myself was circled by a large fly.”

  “There are flies everywhere,” Ruth said. “Even, I presume, in Zweites Himmel’s Lager.”

  “The fly I was referring to did not circle me in Zweites Himmel’s Lager, but in Auschwitz,” Höss said.

  “My mother said there were no flies in Auschwitz,” Ruth said.

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  L I L Y B R E T T

  “That was correct during my time there,” Höss said. “But this fly appeared later in my life.”

  “So what?” said Ruth.

  “Everyone was surprised to see a fly in April,” Höss said. “It was not even late April. It was mid-April. This black fly circled me and circled me.”

  Ruth suddenly realized what day Höss was talking about.

  “It was April 16, wasn’t it?” she said. “The day you were hanged.” She heard Höss wince. The word clearly hurt him.

  “It was April 16,” Höss said. “The day on which I was h-h-h-” He couldn’t get more than the h to come out of him. Ruth started to laugh.

  “The day on which you were hanged,” she said. “It’s not such a hard word to enunciate.”

  “Yes, that day,” Höss said quietly.

  “The day you were hanged in the very gallows in Auschwitz where errant prisoners were hanged,” Ruth said. Höss winced again. A small, piercing wince. Almost a squeak. “You were hanged on your own home ground. Your own turf. Your own territory. Your former kingdom,” Ruth said. She could hear Höss trying to keep his mouth shut. “You were hanged on that day in April,” she said. Höss let out a bleat. “Hanged, hanged, hanged,” Ruth said. Höss yelped. “If I had known this word caused you such difficulties, I would have used it earlier,” Ruth said.

  “Are you interested in the coincidence of the fly?” Höss said. His voice was hoarse and raspy. He cleared his throat several times. “Why do you think the fly bit you?” Höss said.

  Ruth stiffened. “No reason,” she said. “There are no reasons why flies bite you. The fact that there was a large black fly buzzing around you the day you were executed is just coincidence. And not a very notable coincidence.”

  “I would not agree,” Höss said.

  “The fly that bit you has flown closer and closer to me recently. It was circling me that day. My face was next to your face. I was watching you, when the fly flew between us. It bit you and you moved away. The fly was warning you to move out of my orbit.”

  Ruth felt sick. A wave of biliousness rose up in her throat. She wished Höss would go back to his conversation about himself and his wife fleeing the Allies.

  T O O M A N Y M E N

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  “As you wish,” Höss said. “In Wismar, my wife and I heard, by chance, in a farmhouse, that the Führer was dead. When we heard this news,” Höss said, “m
y wife and I knew exactly what we must do. We must go. With the Führer gone, our world would be gone, too. It didn’t seem possible to go on living. We knew we would be hounded and persecuted wherever we went.

  “I had a supply of poison for myself and my wife,” Höss said. “We prepared to take the poison. But then, we decided for the sake of the children, we should try to stay alive.”

  “Good parents to the end,” Ruth said.

  “It was a big mistake,” Höss said. “One which I regret to this day. We all would have been spared a large amount of suffering and grief and distress. The pain and misery my wife and the children had to endure could have been avoided.

  “The Reichsführer was, together with other members of the government, in hiding, in Flensburg. I reported there. It was a disheartening meeting. All talk of continuing to fight for our ideals was gone. It was truly now every man for himself.

  “ ‘Well, gentlemen, this is the end,’ the Reichsführer said to us,” Höss said. “And then he gave us our final directive. ‘Hide in the army,’ he said.

  Hide in the army. Can you believe that? Hide like a coward. To this day I am still filled with disgust at the Reichsführer’s directive.”

  “I sent my son back to his mother, together with my driver and my car,”

  he said.

  “A family man to the very end,” Ruth said.

  “I am not quite at the end,” Höss said. “By sheer chance I heard on the radio that Himmler had been arrested and had taken his own life, with poison. I had my vial of poison on me, also. I made the decision not to take the poison. I would wait and see what eventuated. The departmental staff were given false papers. The papers which would enable them to disappear into the navy.

  “I was fortunate in that I had a certain knowledge about naval life, and I was able to blend in well. But my profession was stated as farmer, I was soon released,” Höss said. “I worked on a farm near Flensburg for eight months. It was a peaceful time. My wife’s brother worked in Flensburg. He helped me to stay in touch with my wife.”

  “You were a close family, obviously,” Ruth said.

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