Fifteen Words

by Monika Jephcott Thomas

  Erika felt the barb in that last statement, intentional or not, and scowled at Karl’s back as he disappeared. Babyface, perceptive as ever, noticed.

  ‘Trouble with the in-laws?’ he whispered.

  ‘Oh, no, no,’ Erika ushered her friend into the most comfortable armchair and pulled another close enough so she didn’t have to speak with any volume to be heard. ‘It’s just that… well, sometimes they seem to handle Max being away so much better than I.’ Before she receded into an unsociable reverie on the scene she thought she was descending the stairs into a minute or so ago, she slapped her knees and chirped, ‘So, what are you doing here anyway, Babe?’

  ‘Your letter?’ Babyface said to his unfocused friend, ‘the one you wrote to me recently?’

  ‘Oh! I did, yes. Yes, of course. Oh, I’m sorry if it sounded so dramatic, but, you know…’

  ‘I know. I understand. It’s not dramatic to feel depressed when your husband has been away for…’

  ‘Three years, nine months and eight days… roughly.’

  They both smiled knowingly at this and it sent Erika’s mind racing back through summer balls, nights in crowded basement bars and intellectual sparring in a draughty room filled with friends all trying to keep warm on a winter’s day; the kind of cerebral stimulation she’d almost forgotten was possible now her life consisted of talking about fairy tales with her daughter or explaining pustules to patients.

  ‘But as much as I love you,’ Erika squeezed her friend’s knee, ‘I’m sure you’re not staying in Dortmund just because of me.’

  ‘How could you say such a thing?’ Babyface pantomimed offence. ‘Actually you’re right, I was sent here to help out at Dortmund paediatric unit, and thought what a perfect excuse to come and see old Erika.’

  His grin only seemed to make his smooth face smoother. Erika thought of the lines she had noticed around her eyes recently and a pulse of paranoia told her that was why he had just used the epithet old. But the paranoia quickly transmuted to envy again.

  ‘I wish Max had chosen paediatrics,’ she said through gritted teeth. ‘I wish all of us had, then the boys might have never had to go to the front and they wouldn’t all be stuck in some Bolshevist hellhole right now.’

  The guilt that Babyface was about to endure for having stayed in Germany throughout the war was quickly obliterated by the memory of Erika’s passion for fascism, which her venomous enunciation of the word Bolshevist told Babyface was yet to be fully extinguished.

  ‘Any more news from the camp?’

  ‘Nothing, since that man came and gave me the address Max had written down.’

  ‘I can ask around at the hospital if you like. You never know. Someone might know someone who knows something.’

  ‘That’s very sweet of you, darling.’ She rubbed his knee now, and to Babyface it felt like there was both warmth and irritation in the action. ‘But perhaps,’ she lowered her voice and darted her eyes towards the kitchen, ‘perhaps we have to face reality. Perhaps they are never coming back’.

  ‘Oh, but…’

  ‘No, Babe, surely it’s only sensible to face it at some point. Netta is growing up fast. She needs a father in her life. What if I wait only to be told eight years from now that Max has died or been executed?’

  Babyface had come to help, but right then confronted with perfect logic and probability, branches of science he entrusted decisions to every day, at home and at work, he felt powerless to do so.

  ‘You’re feeling desperate, tired, I understand,’ he offered. ‘That’s why I’m here. You can talk to me. We can even think about some medicine to help you through.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Benzedrine, methedrine. You must have read about them. Our lot and the Allies were all using them to get through the war. Doctors are using them now to keep going on long shifts too. It can help lift your spirits, Erika.’

  ‘How do you know? Are you using them?’

  She perceived his almost imperceptible hesitation before he replied, which told Erika it was not the answer to her problems.

  ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘sometimes. Look, you need help. Try it and see if it works for you.’

  ‘You’re right, Babe, I do need help. But what I need is a friend…’

  ‘You have that…’

  ‘I know and I love you for that, but I mean I need a partner, a rock, a man around full time. So perhaps I should be… trying that instead of drugs first?’

  ‘Here you go!’ Martha came in with a tray adorned with coffee, biscuits and even napkins.

  We are honoured, Erika sneered inwardly at the display, but said nothing until Babyface had thanked her profusely and Martha had retreated to the kitchen.

  They sipped on coffee. He munched on a biscuit and studied her face as she studied the ripples her tapping finger made in her cup. Eventually he dared to say it.

  ‘Have you been… tempted? I mean, is that what this is all about?’

  ‘What what is all about?’

  ‘All this talk of finding someone else. And your letter, it was like you felt the need to get something off your chest, but you didn’t know where to turn.’

  Erika nodded at the dark waves and tapped so hard now on the edge of the cup some of the coffee nearly spilled out.

  ‘You can tell me anything, you know. We’re buddies, as Edgar would say.’ He tried to lighten the mood with memories of their flamboyant friend. He knew he was so close to a confession that he was more thrilled at the idea of getting one than actually dealing with any fallout from it.

  ‘There is a man,’ she told her cup. ‘A carpenter in the next village.’

  ‘Oh. OK,’ Babyface felt sick with triumph.

  Erika might have been saying something else about this man, about what he looked like perhaps, what they had got up to together even, but the only thing he heard as he tried to digest this information, as the feelings it provoked foamed up inside him, was: ‘He’ll do.’

  ‘He’ll do?’ Babyface quickly drank the remainder of his coffee and put down his cup, freeing his hands for the gesticulation necessary to ram home his point. ‘You mean to tell me you’re going to spoil everything between you and Max for someone who will merely do? Jesus Christ, girl, if you’re going to stab Max in the back at least do it with someone who’s not second best.’

  Erika was rocked by this outburst despite the hushed tones it was executed in. If she had thought about more than just herself for the next few minutes, she would have realised that Babyface was not just worried about her relationship with Max being spoiled, but the destruction of their neat little gang – Horst, Edgar, Max, Erika and Babyface – the five musketeers, whom he was so looking forward to reuniting with when all this mess the war had left was finally behind them.

  ‘I’m not stabbing anyone in the back, Kurt,’ Erika whined. ‘I’m just trying to move on with my life, and do right by my daughter.’

  ‘Max’s daughter too.’

  ‘He might be dead!’

  ‘He wasn’t when that man with the missing fingers came to see you.’

  ‘That was three years ago. Three years in a labour camp.’

  ‘But he was a doctor there. He’ll have more chance of surviving than most. And if anyone will survive it’s those three. Together they’re a pretty formidable bunch, don’t you reckon? Come on, Erika, what were you thinking?’

  ‘I’m thinking I might let you prescribe me some Benzedrine after all,’ she giggled briefly, uncontrollably.

  ‘Oh, grow up, Erika! God knows where you’d be now if it wasn’t for Max.’

  ‘What the hell is that supposed to mean?’ she hissed.

  ‘He saved you.’

  ‘From what?’

  ‘From being an outlaw right now, for one thing. From being one of Hitler’s mindless sheep. From thinking this is OK,’ he said ferreting about in his pocket and pulling out a flyer, which he handed to her.

  At the top of the flyer were the English words REMEMBER THIS! Beneath w
ere five photos. Appalling pictures of emaciated naked bodies piled in long rows being prodded by the barrels of German soldiers. Women picking the clothes off corpses in barbed wire cages. Men in striped pyjamas huddled in the snow in a gateway with a sign forged from wrought iron, incontrovertibly in German, above their heads, which read WORK SETS YOU FREE. Death and abuse on a scale even she as a doctor had never seen. And at the bottom of the page the English words DON’T FRATERNISE!

  ‘What’s this?’ she asked as steadily as she could.

  ‘What the British and Americans are posting around town for their soldiers to read.’

  ‘Is this supposed to make me feel more positive that my husband is in a camp like this, because I’m afraid you’re way off, Babe.’

  ‘Those aren’t pictures from Russian camps, Erika. They are German camps. The kind your heroes sent all the Jews to. The kind they would have sent Edgar to for being queer if they had got to him before the Russians did…’

  ‘This is propaganda, darling, you must know better than to be fooled by fake images like this.’

  ‘… and these are the kind of places they would have sent Professor Hass to for speaking out against the Nazi euthanasia programmes.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Oh, don’t give me that, Erika! Professor Hass, remember? The gent that someone poisoned in the café on campus. Was that a fake? No, it was very real, wasn’t it? I mean, you know better than anyone how real that was, don’t you?’

  STRICTLY PRIVATE & CONFIDENTIAL

  FILE NOTE Minute Taker’s original covert copy before official amendments were made: deleted section marked by red{}

  Name of witness/employee interviewed Stefan Eckstein

  Job title Laboratory assistant

  Department Medicine

  Allegation/Issue Use of university resources for illicit purposes

  Date of interview 1st December 1942

  Interview Venue Rector’s office

  Name(s) of other attendee(s) Jana Tillmann – Minute taker

  Horst Seckler – Rector, Chair and Investigatory officer

  Gregor Brotz – Professor of Biochemistry

  Interview Started 16:10

  Introduction

  * * *

  Mr Eckstein has been asked to attend this interview to assess how cyanide solution from the university laboratories was used to allegedly poison Professor Hass on 29th November 1942.

  Note of Discussions

  * * *

  Horst Seckler (H.S.): Mr Eckstein, I am sure you are aware by now that Professor Hass was poisoned using cyanide solution.

  Stefan Eckstein (S.E.): Yes I am. Terrible. Just terrible.

  H.S: And are you aware that an amount of cyanide solution was taken from the university supplies the day before Professor Hass was poisoned?

  S.E: Well, it wasn’t taken so much as I gave it to someone. I mean, legitimately. I mean, they came like any other student does, showed me their Identification card and told me what the substance they were requesting was for. They signed for it and I gave it to them.

  H.S: And who was it that came and asked you for cyanide on the 28th November?

  S.E: I don’t recall their name, but they showed me their card.

  Gregor Brotz (G.B.): You don’t recall their name, but they showed you their card! Did you even bother to read the card then? Because what the hell is the point of looking at someone’s ID card if you don’t bloody well read it?

  H.S: All right, Professor. Perhaps then Mr Eckstein, you can describe the person in question.

  S.E: I can yes. She was—

  H.S: Ah, it was a woman, was it?

  S.E: Yes. A woman. She was young. She certainly looked of student age. Dark hair, long dark hair, just to here [S.E. puts his hands on his shoulders]. Not particularly tall. Average height for a woman I would say. Brown eyes, I think. And a purple coat. A dark purple coat. Long. With a red scarf.

  G.B: And she just asked you for cyanide and you gave it to her.

  S.E: She asked for a small amount of cyanide solution to use in a study concerning its toxicity in rats. It hardly sounded groundbreaking, but there was nothing unusual in her request. She signed for it anyway. I can easily bring you the records and then we will know her name.

  G.B: Do you really think, Stefan, that someone who intends to use a substance to poison someone else would sign for it using their real name?

  S.E: I don’t know.

  H.S: Well, it shouldn’t be too difficult to identify the woman in question if she is a student at the university. There are so few in the department of medicine. And your description has been very helpful, Mr Eckstein.

  G.B: Have you discussed this incident with anyone else, Stefan? {No need to minute this bit, Jana.

  S.E: No. Well, nobody except my friend Kurt.

  G.B: Kurt?

  S.E: Kurt Bayer, he’s a student in the department.

  H.S: You know him, Gregor?

  G.B: I do, yes. Shouldn’t be a problem.

  H.S: So, Mr Eckstein, it is vital that you do not discuss this matter with anyone else. And you can tell Mr Bayer the same. Both your positions at the university will be in jeopardy if you do. As you can imagine, this is a very serious matter. And in order to catch the culprit we rely on your utmost discretion.

  S.E: Of course. But, Rector, am I in trouble for giving the cyanide to this woman?

  H.S: Not at all, not at all, we understand you were just doing your job. The most important thing now is that you forget about the whole business, all right?

  S.E: All right.

  H.S: Thank you for coming and for your co-operation. Professor Brotz will be sure to let the laboratory head know how helpful you have been and I’m sure that will be most advantageous to you in your career.

  S.E: Oh, well, thank you, sir. [leaves the meeting].

  H.S: Sorry about dragging you over for that, Gregor, but we have to be seen to be doing something, don’t we?

  G.B: Unfortunately, we do.

  H.S: Jana, please type up only the pertinent parts, as Gregor indicated. The rest you can… misplace. Heil Hitler!

  G.B: Heil Hitler!}

  Additional Information

  * * *

  I confirm that this is an accurate record of the meeting held on 1st December 1942

  Interview finished 16:30

  Signed by Investigatory Officer

  Signed by Employee

  Date 1st December 1942

  Erika and the boys were going to the Gauleiter’s speech. The first snow was yet to fall, but everyone could feel it coming. She re-wrapped Max’s scarf around his neck before they left their digs.

  ‘You’ll feel warmer this way,’ she said, enjoying fussing over him, whilst he enjoyed being fussed over. He might as well enjoy something about the next hour, he thought to himself. He certainly wasn’t going to enjoy the rant which would inevitably blast from the little dictator Hitler had appointed to the region, as he had to each region of the country. But since attendance was mandatory, Max went along finding the spectacle both terrifying and yet fascinating, in the way he did the dissection of a tumour on a brain.

  A shrill whistle shot up from the street outside and ricocheted off the wet window. It was Horst letting them know they were waiting.

  ‘Hang on!’ Max grinned as Erika hurried to the door. ‘What about you?’ And he fiddled with her scarf which was actually so neatly tucked into her coat he could not improve on it, but it was a great excuse to touch her once more and to secretly and mischievously enjoy delaying her as he knew how keen she was to hear the Gauleiter speak.

  ‘There’s nothing wrong with my scarf,’ she said slapping his hands away. Although she did so gently and with a smile he was suddenly shot through with resentment for its colour, the red of the National Socialists. In order to expel this feeling he focused on her coat instead, which was of a colour he could find something positive in.

  ‘I love this old coat on you,’ he said.

  She jiggled abo
ut at the door impatiently.

  ‘You look lovely in purple. So… regal.’

  She softened a little. Another whistle penetrated the glass.

  ‘We have to go,’ she said and pulled him from the room.

  ‘Come on, Max and Dorothea!’ Edgar blasted as he strode off ahead of the others, looking up at the lecture hall as he passed with the words THE TRUTH WILL SET YOU FREE carved in gold above the great windows; the lecture hall where the illustrious Professor Hass would be speaking in a couple of days time, and Edgar couldn’t wait.

  The Gauleiter’s speech took place in the Platz right in front of the cathedral. It was no coincidence. As Max, Edgar and Horst were to find out soon enough at the convent in Breslau, Hitler enjoyed such symbolic gestures when it came to the church. Not that the Gauleiter, peacocking behind a swastika-clad lectern, was merely going to rely on symbolism today. His words were flagrant, unequivocal.

  ‘The Bishop of Eichstätt said in a… subtle, but unmistakable way that the Church had sole claim to the worldview education of baptised Catholic youth. He proclaimed the same right with regards to Catholic organisations. He was just as sly but unmistakable in objecting to a ban of political activity on the part of priests. He said that the political revolution was over and that “the National Socialist movement’s battle for people’s minds” was an attack on the Church, on Catholic bishops, priests, indeed on Catholicism in general.’

  ‘Of course it is,’ Erika heard Max mumble to Edgar. ‘Hitler wants to be God. He wants the divine right to say who lives and dies. He expects blind faith from everyone.’

  ‘Well, the church insists on devotion even if you doubt,’ Erika said keeping her eyes firmly on the Gauleiter, her head up, her arms folded, against the cold, against doubt.

  ‘But it doesn’t do so by threatening you with imprisonment or worse otherwise,’ Horst said louder than the others were comfortable with.

  Erika’s response was ventriloquist-like. ‘No, it just threatens fire and brimstone. Come on, Horst, you know the church should clean up its own act before casting aspersions on the National Socialists.’