The Librarian of Auschwitz

by Antonio Iturbe

Usually when the little kids follow to watch his pranks, Gabriel tries to shake them off or scare them away. So Dita is surprised that he seems happy to have such a crowd tagging along behind him. She decides to follow them at a distance.

  She sees them heading toward the camp’s exit, at which point she realizes where they’re going—the kitchen. Gabriel’s friends come to a halt a safe distance from the off-limits kitchen building, but Gabriel continues inside. The others gather around the door. What happens next reminds Dita of a scene from a comedy. Gabriel emerges at a run, followed by a very bad-tempered cook called Beata, who’s waving her arms like a windmill to scare off the flock of children as if they were birds.

  Dita realizes they must have come to ask for potato peelings, one of the children’s favorite treats. But it seems the cook is fed up with freeloaders, and she’s decided to send them packing. Gabriel and the older children don’t retreat; rather, the boys split into two groups, leaving a corridor down which Gabriel and the angry cook make their way. Gabriel dodges to one side, and the cook almost slips and falls on a patch of ice. When she regains her balance, she finds herself confronted by the group of little children who’ve just arrived. They’re all still holding hands and breathing heavily because of the effort they’ve had to make to keep up with the older boys. Beata can’t avoid the sight of their permanently hungry expressions. Caught unawares by a herd of mud-and-snow-covered cherubs with imploring eyes in front of her, she stops waving her arms and puts her hands on her hips.

  Dita can’t hear her, but she doesn’t have to. The cook has a strong personality, rough hands, and a tender heart. Dita smiles when she thinks of Gabriel’s cunning. He’s led the youngest children to that spot to soften up the cook. Beata is undoubtedly telling them in her strictest voice that she’s prohibited from handing over any leftovers without authorization, that if the Kapo catches her or any other kitchen hand doing so, they’ll lose their jobs and be severely punished, that this and that and blah, blah, blah.… The children keep looking at her with their doe eyes, so … she’ll make an exception this time, but they’d better not think of coming back, or she’ll beat them. Some of the children nod their heads in agreement, fully aware that they have her eating out of their hands.

  The cook disappears inside the hut and comes back out a few minutes later with a metal bucket full of potato peelings. She puts a halt to the threat of a riot by holding up her large hand, making them come up one by one, starting with the youngest and ending with the oldest. Then they return to Block 31 chewing on their potato skins.

  Dita heads back along the Lagerstrasse in a good mood, but halfway back, she bumps into her mother, who is looking unusually disheveled for someone who, even inside Auschwitz, has managed to get hold of an old bit of comb. Her mother always has her hair carefully arranged.

  So Dita knows something is wrong. She runs to her mother, who gives her an uncharacteristically strong hug and tells Dita that when she went to meet her husband outside his workshop, he wasn’t there. A fellow worker, Mr. Brady, told her that he hadn’t come to work in the morning because he couldn’t get out of his bunk.

  “Mr. Brady told me your father has a fever, but the Kapo said it was better not to take him to the hospital.”

  Her mother is confused and doesn’t really know what to do.

  “Maybe I should insist the Kapo send him to hospital.”

  “Papa said that the Kapo in his hut is a German social democrat, not a Jew. He’s aloof, but quite fair. Maybe the hospital isn’t a good idea. The hospital is in front of Block Thirty-One.…”

  Dita stops. She’s on the point of saying that the sick people she sees hobbling in usually come out on the corpse cart pushed by Mr. Lada and others. But she mustn’t speak of death; death must be kept far away from her father.

  “We can’t even see him,” moans Dita’s mother. “We can’t go into the men’s huts. I asked Mr. Brady, who’s a very kind gentleman from Bratislava, to do me the favor of going inside to see him while I waited at the entrance, and then coming back out to tell me how he was.” She has to pause, overcome with emotion. Dita holds her hand. “Mr. Brady told me he’s no different from how he was this morning: semiconscious because of the fever. And that he looked bad. Edita, maybe your father should go to the hospital.”

  “We’ll go and see him.”

  “What are you saying? We can’t go inside the hut! It’s forbidden.”

  “It’s also forbidden to lock people up and kill them, but I don’t see that stopping anyone around here. Wait for me at the entrance to the hut.”

  Dita runs off in search of Milan, one of the assistants in Block 31. Although he’s good looking, Dita doesn’t find him very likeable.

  She finds Milan beside Block 31. It’s one of those relentlessly cold Polish afternoons, but he and a couple of his friends are sitting outside, propped up against the wooden boards. They’re killing time watching the other inmates go by and making comments about the girls. She’s not thrilled at the prospect of standing in front of these slightly older boys, who have the hint of a mustache under their noses and a host of pimples, but who behave like a bunch of fighting cocks. She feels uneasy when she’s around them; she thinks they make fun of her skinny legs and her somewhat childish woolen leggings. But she parks herself in front of them, knowing that she can’t allow herself to be timid.

  “Well, well!” screeches Milan, speaking first so it’s clear he’s the leader. “Look who’s here. It’s the librarian—”

  “You’re not supposed to talk about that outside Block Thirty-One,” Dita interrupts. And she instantly regrets her gruffness because the boy goes red. He doesn’t like being shown up in front of his friends by a younger girl—and Dita has come to ask him a favor. “You see, Milan, I want to ask you something.…”

  The three friends elbow each other and begin to giggle slyly. Milan, also encouraged, starts to brag.

  “Well, girls usually ask me for lots of things,” he says smugly, glancing out of the corner of his eye at his two friends to see how they’re reacting to his words. They laugh, showing their broken teeth.

  “I need you to lend me your big, long jacket for a while.”

  Milan’s face shows his utter astonishment, and his giggles peter out. His jacket? She’s asking him for his jacket? He was incredibly lucky to score the jacket when they were handing out the clothing; it’s one of the best jackets in BIIb. He’s been offered bread rations and even potatoes for it, but he’s not prepared to get rid of it at any price. How would he put up with those afternoons when the temperature dips below freezing without his jacket? And anyway, he looks good in it. The girls like him more when he’s wearing it.

  “Are you nuts? Nobody touches my jacket. And nobody means nobody, do you hear?”

  “It won’t be for long—”

  “Don’t be stupid. Not for a minute, not at all! Do you think I’m an idiot? I give you the jacket, you sell it, and I never see it again. You’d better leave before I get really mad!” And as he’s saying this, he stands up with a sour expression on his face, and it’s obvious that he’s at least twenty centimeters taller than Dita.

  “I only want it for a short while. You can stay with me the whole time to make sure the jacket doesn’t disappear. I’ll give you my evening ration of bread.”

  Dita has mentioned a magic word: food. An extra ration for a growing boy who can’t remember the last time he was able to satisfy his hunger is a big promise. His stomach growls all the time, the anxiety over food has become an obsession, and the only thing that excites him more than dreaming about a girl’s thigh is dreaming about a chicken thigh.

  “A whole ration,” he repeats as he weighs up the proposal, already imagining the feast. He would even be able to save part of it to accompany his morning slop and have a real breakfast. “You’re saying that you’ll wear the jacket for a short while, I’ll accompany you, and then you’ll return it?”

  “Right. I’m not going to trick you. We work in the same
hut, so if I tricked you and you reported me, they’d fire me from my position in Block Thirty-One. And none of us wants to leave that hut.”

  “Okay, let me think about it.”

  The three boys put their heads together, and there’s a mix of whispers and the odd laugh. Finally, a smiling Milan lifts his head triumphantly.

  “Fine. I give you the jacket for a while in exchange for a ration of bread … but we all get to touch your tits!” He glances at his companions, and they nod so enthusiastically their heads look as if they’re mounted on springs.

  “Don’t be an idiot. I hardly have any.…”

  She notices that the three of them are laughing as if they were having a great time, or as if they needed the sound of their laughter to hide their nervousness and awkwardness when dealing with such matters. Dita snorts. If they weren’t so much taller than her, she’d give each of them a slap.

  For being so brazen … or so stupid.

  But she has no choice.

  And after all, what does it matter?

  “Fine, okay. Now let me try on the damn jacket.”

  Milan shivers when he finds himself out in the open with only the three-button shirt he’s wearing underneath the jacket. Dita puts on the long jacket, which is enormous on her, exactly as she’d hoped. This article of clothing features an item which makes it very valuable to her right now, and which few other such garments in the camp possess—a hood. She marches off with Milan close behind.

  “Where are we going?”

  “To Barrack Fifteen.”

  “And your tits?”

  “Later.”

  “Did you say Barrack Fifteen? But that’s a men’s hut—”

  “Right…” And Dita puts the hood over her head, leaving it almost completely hidden.

  Milan stops.

  “Wait. You’re not seriously thinking of going in there? Women are forbidden. I have no intention of going in there with you. If they catch you, they’ll punish me, too. I think you’re a bit mad.”

  “I’m going inside. With you or without you.”

  The boy’s eyes widen, and he shivers even more with cold.

  “If you want, you can wait for me at the door.”

  Milan has to walk faster because Dita is striding quickly. She sees her mother a few meters away, lurking near the entrance to her father’s hut, and she doesn’t stop to greet her. Liesl Adler is so upset that she hasn’t even recognized her daughter inside the male garment. Dita walks into the hut without hesitating, and nobody takes any notice of her. Milan has stopped by the door cursing, unsure whether the girl has tricked him and he’ll never see his jacket again.

  Dita makes her way through the rows of bunks. Some men are lying on top of the horizontal stove, which isn’t operating, while others are sitting on their bunks and chatting. Some are lying down on their bunks, even though doing so before lights-out is prohibited, all of which suggests they have a benevolent Kapo. The smell is really strong, worse than in her women’s hut, a nauseating smell of acrid sweat. Dita hasn’t removed her hood, and nobody pays any attention to her.

  She finds her father at the back of the hut, stretched out on the straw mattress of his bottom bunk. She pulls back her hood and brings her face close to his.

  “It’s me,” she whispers.

  His eyes are half closed, but when he hears his daughter, he opens them slightly. Dita puts her hand on his forehead; it’s burning. She’s not sure if he’s recognized her, but she takes one of his hands and continues to talk to him in a whisper. It’s usually difficult to talk to someone when you don’t know if he’s hearing you, but her words flow with surprising ease, and she tells him the things you never stop to say because you think there’ll always be time in future to say them.

  “Do you remember when you used to teach me geography at home? I remember it really well.… You know so many things! I’ve always been very proud of you, Papa. Always.”

  And she talks to him about the good times during her childhood in Prague, and the good moments in the Terezín ghetto, and how much she and her mother love him. She tells him over and over again so the words will filter through his fever. And she thinks he moves slightly. Maybe somewhere deep inside, he’s listening to her.

  Hans Adler is fighting against pneumonia with very few weapons—a lone, malnourished man broken by all the elements of war against a microbial army bursting with energy. Dita recalls Paul de Kruif’s book about the microbe hunters she had read just before they left Prague: If you look at germs under a microscope, they look like a miniaturized pack of predators. Too many to take on.

  She releases his hand, tucks it under the dirty sheet, and kisses him on his forehead. She pulls up her hood again and turns to leave. And in that moment, she catches sight of Milan, a few steps away. She thinks he must be furious, but the boy is looking at her with unexpected tenderness.

  “Your father?” he asks.

  Dita nods. She hunts for something under her clothing and pulls out her evening ration of bread. She holds it out to him, but the boy keeps his hands in his pockets and refuses it with a shake of his head. She reaches the door of the hut and removes the jacket. When her mother recognizes her, she looks puzzled.

  “Will you lend it to my mother for a moment?” And without waiting for his answer, she says, “Put it on and go inside.”

  “But, Edita—”

  “You’ll be disguised. Come on! It’s at the back on the right. He’s not conscious, but I think he can hear us.”

  The woman adjusts the hood and, covered up, goes inside stealthily. Milan stands silently beside Dita, unsure what to do or say.

  “Thanks, Milan.”

  The boy nods and hesitates for a moment, as if he is searching for the right words.

  “As far as … you know what,” Dita says to him as she looks down at her almost-flat chest.

  “Forget it, please!” Milan replies, blushing and waving his hands dramatically. “I’ve got to go now; return the jacket tomorrow.”

  He turns on his heel and rushes off. He wonders how he’s going to explain to his friends why he’s returning with no jacket and no girl. They’ll think he’s an idiot. He could tell them that he ate the bread on his way back to them, and that he touched her tits on behalf of all of them, since the jacket is his, after all. But he dismisses that with a shake of his head. He knows they’ll spot the lie right away. He’ll tell them the truth. They’ll laugh at him for sure, and tell him he’s gullible. But he knows how to fix things like that. He’ll hit the first one who says anything so hard he’ll have to search for his teeth with a magnifying glass. And then everyone will be friends again.

  Margit turns up while Dita is waiting for Liesl to reappear. From the distraught expression on her face, it’s clear that Margit has heard about Dita’s father. In Auschwitz, news, and bad news in particular, spreads fast. Margit walks up to her and gives her hug.

  “How’s your father?”

  Dita knows that this question hides another more serious one: Will he live?

  “He’s not well, he has a high fever, and his chest rattles when he breathes.”

  “You must have faith, Dita. Your father has overcome many things.”

  “Too many.”

  “He’s a strong man. He’ll fight.”

  “He was strong, Margit. But these past few years have aged him a lot. I’ve always been an optimist. But I don’t know what to think anymore. I don’t know anymore if we’ll all be able to hold out.”

  “Of course we will.”

  “Why are you so sure?”

  Her friend remains silent for a few seconds, biting her lip as she searches for an answer.

  “Because I want to believe it.”

  The two girls don’t say another word. The age when you think that just wanting something is enough to make it happen is slipping away from them.

  The curfew siren goes off, and her mother emerges from the hut like a ghost dragging its feet through the mud.

  “We must
hurry,” says Margit.

  “You go—run,” Dita replies. “We’ll come a bit more slowly.”

  Her friend says good-bye, and mother and daughter are left by themselves. Her mother looks lost.

  “How’s Papa?”

  “A bit better,” Liesl replies. But her voice is so broken it gives the lie to what she’s saying. And anyway, Dita knows her all too well. Liesl has spent her entire life trying to make everything right, attempting to ensure that nothing alters the natural order of things.

  “Did he recognize you?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “So did he say anything to you?”

  “No … he was a bit tired. He’ll be better tomorrow.”

  And they don’t say another word until they reach their hut.

  He’ll be better tomorrow.

  Her mother said it with a conviction that left no room for doubt, and mothers know these things. Dita takes her mother’s hand, and they walk more quickly.

  When they enter the hut, almost all the women are already lying down on their bunks, and they come face-to-face with the Kapo, a Hungarian with the orange badge of a common criminal, a superior status. A thief, a swindler, a murderess … any one of these is more valuable than a Jew. She’s been overseeing the placement of the containers used by the women to relieve themselves during the night, and when she sees Dita and her mother arriving late, she lifts the stick in her hand threateningly.

  “I’m sorry, Kapo, but my father—”

  “Shut up and get on your pallet, idiot.”

  “Yes, madam.”

  Dita pulls on her mother’s hand, and they walk to their bunks. Liesl slowly climbs up and, before lying down, briefly turns toward Dita. Her lips don’t move, but her eyes show her pain.

  “Don’t worry, Mama,” says her daughter encouragingly. “If there’s no change in Papa, we’ll talk to his Kapo in the morning about taking him to the doctor. If need be, I’ll speak with the director of Block Thirty-One. Fredy Hirsch will be able to help us.”

  “He’ll be better tomorrow.”

  The lights go out, and Dita says good night to her bunkmate, who doesn’t respond. She’s so distressed she can’t even close her eyes. She recalls images of her father and tries to sort out the best ones. There’s one she especially likes: It’s of her parents seated at the piano. Both of them are elegant and handsome—her father in a white shirt with the cuffs rolled up, a dark tie, and suspenders; her mother in a fitted blouse that accentuates her waist. They’re laughing, because it’s obvious they can’t find a way to coordinate their movements to play a four-handed piece. They are happy.