by Peter Haden
‘You said when we first moved into the house that Helga seemed to resent your arrival,’ Günther replied. ‘Maybe you should think about whether you want to keep her on? After all, it’s your home and you can do without having to put up with tension from the staff.’
‘There’s something else,’ Hannah went on. ‘You know I brought very little with me when we set up home together – not much more than my clothes and jewellery. But there was one thing: my mother’s Menorah – it was her own mother’s and her grandmother’s before her. She was very observant, and to her it meant the world. I’m not religious, but it is one of the few things of my mother’s that I still have, so it means a lot to me, too.’
‘Where do you keep it?’ asked Günther, fearing what the answer would be.
‘I’m sorry, it should have been in your safe,’ she said anxiously, unconsciously wringing her hands, ‘but it’s in my bottom drawer, under a pile of woollens, and I think the damned woman has found it.’
Günther thought for a minute or so. ‘We don’t know for sure,’ he said at length. She shook her head uncertainly. ‘Let’s not cross bridges before we get to them,’ he went on. ‘Even if she has seen it, which she probably hasn’t, in any case you are married to me. I don’t think there’s much that she could do with the information. It wasn’t a good idea to leave it in a drawer,’ he added not unkindly, ‘and we should put it in my safe. Other than that, for now I don’t think we need to be panicked into doing anything.’
The year nineteen thirty-nine was, if anything, worse for the Jews. In January SS leader Reinhard Heydrich was ordered by Göring to speed up their emigration. The following month, the Nazis forced the Jews in Germany to hand over all their gold and silver possessions. Hannah turned a blind eye to the instruction and left her Menorah in Günther’s safe. In March German troops seized Czechoslovakia, with its Jewish population of three hundred and fifty thousand souls. The rest of Europe did nothing. And in July, Jews in Germany and Czechoslovakia were denied the right to hold any government positions.
Jan was within weeks of completing his apprenticeship. Unbeknown to him, old Johann had recently had a long conversation with Herr Raschdorf. ‘The lad’s as good as I am,’ the former mariner told his employer. ‘He can read drawings and use any machine in the shop. He’s also a first-class welder and a good blacksmith. But it goes beyond that. He’s borrowed all my books. He understands metallurgy, stress and structural engineering. And there’s a good business head on those young shoulders. I doubt he’s mispriced or made a loss on a job since we took him on. Best of all,’ he concluded, ‘the young devil has an easy charm and he gets on well with people, ordinary folk to wealthy farmer clients…’
‘It’s nearly three years now,’ Günther replied. ‘Tell him that come the anniversary, we’ll promote him to fully-fledged junior engineer. The title doesn’t mean much, really, but he’ll appreciate the pay rise that goes with it.’
It was towards the end of the following month that Jan, thrilled by his forthcoming change of circumstances, took an early morning walk from the estate to the now Tarmac-surfaced road that led past the drive into the property. Woken by a dull rumbling sound that had started a couple of hours earlier, as he approached the road birdsong was silenced by the roar of engines and the metallic squeal of tracked machinery. He stood in amazement as a column of mixed wheeled vehicles, half-tracks and tanks drove past, left to right, west to east – towards the border with his native Poland.
Retreating from the dust at the junction of drive and road, he walked back to his room above the workshop, deep in thought. First, he told Johann what he had seen, then they walked to the big house, set much further back and away from the noise.
Günther listened then thought things over. Clearly the lad was worried. ‘Do you want to take Lujza?’ he suggested. The mare was a second-generation offspring of Günther’s beloved Grane, now sadly no longer alive, but more of a chestnut than a Grey. ‘I’ll take Alger, and we’ll ride after breakfast. See what’s going on. You happy to leave in about an hour?’
With Günther astride his massive Alger they set off cross-country, about half a kilometre from and parallel with the road. But a good seven kilometres from the border they were halted by a Wehrmacht detachment that emerged from a hedge, rifles pointing at the ground but clearly instantly ready. Beyond the hedge, they could see perhaps a hundred vehicles of different types, and beyond them a massive field encampment.
‘Was machen Sie, und wo gehen Sie?’ demanded a young NCO.
‘We are exercising the horses,’ replied Günther politely, ‘and we are from my estate over there.’ He thumbed vaguely behind him over his shoulder. ‘As for where we are going,’ he went on, ‘we have been riding this way since I was old enough to sit on a farm pony.’
‘I’m sorry, meine Herren,’ he told them, ‘but the area behind me is now a closed military zone for our exercises. Please go back the way you have come. I expect your normal ride will be open again soon,’ he finished, obviously trying to be helpful.
‘Danke,’ responded Günther, giving the young man the formal salute from his own army days. It was recognised, but the response was the stiff-armed reply of Hitler’s Nazi party. ‘Kommen Sie bitte schnell,’ he said to Jan, not wanting to use his name, as he right-wheeled his mount. The younger man followed immediately without speaking. His German was pretty fluent by now, but he had never succeeded in losing his eastern accent.
They returned to the estate at a gentle canter. Not until they had dismounted and Günther’s groom had taken the horses did he turn to Jan.
‘Well,’ he exhaled, ‘what did you make of that?’
‘It looks like an army on the move, sir,’ Jan responded. ‘And it’s hard up against the Polish border.’
‘I’m going to ride out each morning,’ said Günther. ‘To a different place every day, a bit to the left, then a bit to the right. Not as near as we went just now, only so that I can see if they are still there. It’s safer for me than it would be for you but I’ll let you know what’s happening. For now, you can tell Johann, but don’t discuss this with anyone else.’
Jan bowed his head in agreement and went to help look after the horses. But he was troubled.
Ten days later, Günther looked at the fields beyond the hedge that he and Jan had first approached. The ground was churned to mud but the fields were empty. A flight of German bombers passed high overhead, their black swastikas just visible. There was a faint rumble of what he recognised as artillery from somewhere in the distance. He set Alger at the hedge and went on for a kilometre or so, but other than the destruction left by a mixed armoured and infantry formation on the move, the countryside was empty.
It was, he realised, the first day of September nineteen thirty-nine.
Chapter 10
Jan was working on the clutch housing of an old Raschdorf 35 when the phone rang in a corner of the building boarded off to make a small office.
‘The Boss wants to speak with you,’ Johann told him. ‘He said please go to the front door and Gudrun will let you in.’
Pausing only to give his oily hands a hasty scrub, Jan walked to the house and smoothed himself down as best he could. He was about to lift the knocker when the door opened. ‘Please follow me, Jan,’ she said pleasantly.
They walked through a large entrance hall and down a long corridor patterned with diamond-shaped black and white tiles. Gudrun stopped in front of an oak door. Inside it was more like a small library than a study. Herr Raschdorf rose from behind the largest desk Jan had ever seen.
‘Please sit down,’ he invited, his hand indicating one of two comfortable chairs in front of the desk. Günther took the other. ‘Jan,’ he went on, ‘I have just got back from where we rode just under two weeks ago. The Wehrmacht is no longer there. Also, you must have seen the planes flying over.’
‘I was in the workshop, Herr Raschdorf,
’ replied Jan. ‘Although when I heard the engine noises I went outside to look. I did wonder…’
‘It’s also been on the wireless,’ his employer told him. ‘I’m afraid it looks as if that madman has invaded Poland. He got away with the Anschluss, and after Austria, England and France did nothing about the Sudetenland last year – or Czechoslovakia this March either, come to that. But this time he’s gone too far. The British and the French will probably take a few days to make up their mind, but I suspect that the former, at least, will give Hitler an ultimatum. Either he withdraws from Poland, which I don’t think he will, or Europe will be at war.’
‘I know that’s serious, Herr Raschdorf,’ said Jan. ‘But right now, I’m worried about my family. If those troops we saw headed east from the border, they would almost certainly have crossed our farm.’
‘Which is why I asked you to come and speak with me,’ Günther told him. ‘I have always been on good terms with your parents and they have my respect. It suited all of us when I needed an apprentice and you had to carve out a career. And I might tell you, I think I have probably had the best of the bargain…’
Jan smiled at the compliment.
‘… but I have always felt that I owed a duty to your parents – in loco parentis, as it were.’ Jan did not recognise the Latin, but he knew that Herr Raschdorf had always honoured a certain responsibility to keep an eye on him.
‘I understand your concerns entirely,’ Günther told him. ‘If I were in your shoes, the first thing I would want to do would be to cross back over the border and make sure that everything was all right. Am I correct?’ he asked.
Jan could only nod his head in reply.
‘So, this is what I’m suggesting,’ his employer went on. ‘I thought about going by road, but there is bound to be a lot of military traffic and we would probably get turned back at some stage, or at the very least held up and questioned. Instead, supposing we ride as close as we can to the border. The Wehrmacht’s gone, so there shouldn’t be a problem. And I doubt if the border even exists any more. Once we can assess the situation, take Lujza if you wish, and ride to the farm. I’ll come back here.
‘But I want you to know,’ his employer emphasised, ‘that whatever you find on the other side of the border, and even if our countries are at war, you will always be welcome on this estate. We look on you as part of the family now, and as such I have a duty to keep you safe.’
‘Thank you, Sir,’ Jan replied. ‘I’m grateful for the ride to the border,’ he added, ‘but I would be a bit conspicuous on the other side – a Polish lad on a thoroughbred horse. I can walk to the farm in an hour or so, maybe a bit longer if I keep to the woods and hedges. I know the lie of the land… it would probably be safer. All being well, I would like to spend a night with my parents, then perhaps cross back over the border at dawn tomorrow.’
‘That’s what we’ll do then,’ said Günther kindly. ‘Meet me at the stables when you are ready. Take some warm clothes, and I’ll have Frau Brantis put some food in a satchel for you. We’ll ride to the border, assuming that we can, then as Alger has already made the return trip once today, I’ll ride Lujza back with my horse on a lead rein.’
‘Ich bin dankbar, Herr Raschdorf,’ Jan told him.
‘Don’t mention it,’ said Günther. ‘This has been your home for almost three years now – it’s the least I can do. Let’s just hope to God that things turn out all right for all of us.’
Before they mounted Günther handed Jan a sealed envelope. ‘It’s a “to whom it may concern”,’ he told him. ‘If you get stopped by any of our people, the letter says that you are a valued mechanic working on my estate and that you have my permission to take a couple of days leave to visit your parents, but also that you will be returning to work for me afterwards. It might just come in handy…’ he tailed off.
Jan placed the letter inside the leather satchel that Günther had also handed him – obviously a personal possession since it had the initials “G R” embossed on it. They took advantage of a mounting block and set off across Günther’s fields to the east.
At what had once been the border, which was now just a mangled stretch of wire, they dismounted. Günther offered Jan his hand. ‘Good luck,’ he told him, ‘and I hope everything is all right. My regards to your parents and come back as soon as you can. Most important of all, come back safe.’
‘Danke sehr,’ Jan replied. ‘And once more, thank you for your kindness. I’m grateful.’
Günther mounted the smaller Lujza and took his own horse on the lead rein. Jan watched him for a few minutes then faced east and started walking.
Returning home, Günther was surprised to see a black Adler Trumpf parked in front of the house. The front door was slightly ajar. Gudrun ran to meet him as soon as he walked into the hall.
‘I’m sorry, Sir,’ she rushed to explain. ‘There are two men in the drawing room. They say they are from the Schutzstaffel. I tried to tell them that you and the mistress were not here, she’s gone to the village, but they just pushed past me. Frau Brantis was ordered to give them coffee and I was told to pour cognac, but when she told them that she took orders only from the mistress, and that she would give them coffee as and when the mistress asked her to, they shouted at us. We were afraid, so we did as they said.’
Günther was angry, but knew he had to stay calm. ‘Don’t worry, it’s all right,’ he reassured Gudrun. Even so, when he walked into the room he was surprised to be greeted by Helga’s husband, his former estate worker Berndt Gross, now wearing a passably respectable dark suit. The other man was presumably his driver. They remained seated. ‘Good morning, Herr Gross,’ he said evenly, sitting opposite them.
‘I am not in uniform, so you would not know,’ came the reply, ‘but you will address me as Unterscharführer Gross,’ he said abruptly. ‘I returned to this district on promotion. Specifically, I am with the Allgemeine SS. The racial division,’ he added ominously. ‘I have my credentials, should you wish to see them.’
Günther’s heart rate increased – he could sense where this was leading. But he forced himself to appear calm. Opening his palms, he indicated that producing documents would not be necessary. In any case, he had heard of Gross’ appointment through the village gossip.
‘So to what do I owe this visit?’ he asked evenly, thanking his lucky stars that Hannah and Renate had not been at home when these two louts arrived.
‘My superiors have decided that you will support the war effort,’ Günther was told. ‘I have not come in uniform because we do not wish to cause speculation and talk amongst the locals. But your estate is conveniently adjacent to the border. As you will know, this morning the Third Reich began to take lebensraum from Poland. We require a vehicle repair facility – a workshop, if you like, where we can bring back damaged equipment from the front for repair and subsequent return to the field army. Your facilities here will eventually need to be expanded. This we confirmed with an inspection this morning. Also, this house will be able to accommodate the senior engineers and officers.’
‘My facilities, as you call them, are in use already,’ Günther replied. ‘As you doubtless will be aware, I have an agricultural sales and repair business that I am not prepared just to abandon. Neither do I have the staff for what you suggest – at the moment, I have only Johann and one apprentice. They could not possibly cope with all that extra work.’
‘You will be reimbursed,’ Gross continued, as if Günther had not spoken. ‘You might even find it more profitable. And you will be provided with workers – true, they will be Untermenschen from Poland, but you will not have to pay them, or feed them much, for that matter.’
‘This is my family home,’ Günther informed him, making a huge effort not to raise his voice. ‘I am not prepared to share it with strangers.’
‘What has been ordered is not a basis for discussion,’ came the reply.
‘I refuse,’ said Günther bluntly.
‘Herr Raschdorf,’ responded Gross with false reasonableness, ‘of course you can refuse. But I am from the racial department – we have done our homework and we know that your wife’s former name was Rosenthal. You have married a Jew, and from that union you have a Mischling.’
Günther was mortified to hear his lovely daughter referred to as a hybrid human being. ‘With or without your assistance and co-operation,’ Gross went on, ‘this project will go ahead. But with it, your family, provided that you fulfil your side of our agreement, will possibly survive the war. Without it, your wife and daughter will become inmates of Dachau. It is a camp where we place persons who are no longer desirable within the Reich – mostly intellectuals, homosexuals and Jews.’ Heavy emphasis on the final word drove home the threat.
He paused to let his message sink in. ‘I congratulate you,’ he continued coldly, ‘your Aryan blood has been dominant. Your Mischling does not look like a Jew. But impure as she is, she is quite beautiful, so I might offer her to the commandant of Dachau. Although if he does not want her, I suspect he will give her to his guards; perhaps after I have tried her out for myself, of course.’
Günther was halfway out of his chair when the driver whipped out an automatic, at the same time sliding the mechanism to chamber a round. Clearly Günther’s reaction had been anticipated. There was no way he could close the gap without taking a bullet. Slowly, his hands still on the arms of the chair, he sank back into his seat.
‘I am sure when you have taken time to consider, you will see the wisdom of my argument,’ concluded Gross, rising to his feet. ‘In the meantime, Helga will not work here any more, although you will continue to pay her wages in the form of a pension. And she will remain in the cottage. You can write the costs off against the considerable profit you will doubtless enjoy from your contribution to the war industry.’
He handed Günther a card with a name and telephone number. ‘Phone this person within twenty-four hours with your decision.’
