by Dean Hughes
“What religion?”
Elder Mecham took a deep breath. “The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.”
“I never heard of that.” The man’s white hair, limp and yellowish, had not been cut for some time. Folds of skin seemed to cut his eyes in half. Red eyes. But he did have good teeth—or maybe false teeth.
“Members of our church . . .” He still couldn’t say that blasted word—Kirche. It came out ‘keer-kuh,’ and Germans often had no idea what he meant. So he repeated it, tried to get the “ch” sound right, and made a noise too much like clearing his throat. “Members of our church are sometimes called Mormons.”
“Ach. Die Mormonen. I know all about that. Vielweiberei!”
It was the word Germans used for plural marriage, but it was not easily translated. The picture was lusty—calling up images of a harem. Elder Thomas had acquired a disgust for the word—and for the accusation. His own great-grandfather had been a polygamist and a fine man. He saw no point to this. He decided to step in and end the conversation. “Would you like to read this?” he asked, offering the tract.
The man didn’t take it, but he didn’t shut the door in their faces either. He was still looking at Elder Mecham. “You’re a big man,” he said. “What do you do in America?”
“Ich bin cowboy,” Elder Mecham said, and laughed. Germans knew the English word. They knew the movies, too. Elder Mecham had found it more fun to claim he was a cowboy than a farmer.
“Tom Mix?” the little man said, smiling, his big teeth showing better now—and looking clearly false. He pronounced the first name as if it were “tome.”
“That’s me,” Elder Mecham said. He thought of telling the man that he had a quick draw, but he had no idea how to say that.
At least the man was smiling. “You’re a very big man,” he said again. “A cowboy.”
“Here, read this,” Elder Mecham tried again. “You should know the truth about us. Not the lies.”
The man nodded. “It’s good.” He took the tract and said, “Auf Wiedersehen,” not “Heil Hitler.” And he sounded friendly.
Elder Thomas slapped Elder Mecham on the back. “Good job,” he said.
“Yeah, now he thinks Mormons are a bunch of cowboys.”
“That’s okay. That’s better than what he thought before.”
The elders knocked on a few more doors, got turned away, and then walked out into the cold. The sky, the apartment buildings, the street—everything—seemed to have blended into a seamless drabness, like a slab of concrete. “Let’s buy our lunch today—get something hot,” Elder Thomas said.
But Elder Mecham was looking down the street. “What’s going on down there?” he asked.
“A Nazi parade. The local party is putting it on. You’ve seen all those handbills posted around town, haven’t you?”
“Oh, yeah,” Elder Mecham said. “I didn’t know it was today. Let’s go take a look.”
“I think we’d better stay away.”
“Come on. There’s nothing they can say about us watching one of their parades.”
Elder Thomas shrugged and said, “All right. But let’s just take a look and then go.”
When the elders reached the corner, they could see that the parade had not arrived, but a crowd had gathered. Many of the people were men on their midday breaks. Stores all closed for two hours at lunchtime. Plenty of women also lined the street, bundled up in their dark coats and warm hats. And school children were bunched together, the boys in their long winter Lederhosen and the girls with leggings under their uniform skirts. In the distance, Elder Thomas could see a man carrying a Nazi flag, and behind him a military unit marching in goose step.
“Let’s cross the street,” Elder Thomas said. “We can stand in that park and stay back from the crowd.”
“Why? We can see better here.”
“Let’s just stay out of the way.”
So they crossed the street, and once they were behind the people, back on the frozen ground of the park, no one paid attention to them. They kept their backs to the breeze and tucked their hands deep into their coat pockets.
“I hope they bring out their big Panzers,” Elder Mecham said.
“They’ll have some.” Elder Thomas had seen plenty of these parades. Hitler loved to keep his armies in front of the people, and local party leaders looked for any excuse to display military weapons and spit-and-polish troops. Red Nazi flags with the black “hooked-cross”—the swastika—were draped from the buildings and hung from lampposts all along the street. In a couple of minutes Elder Thomas saw the people along the parade route begin to raise their arms. The flag was approaching.
“I’m not doing that,” Elder Mecham said, but he glanced around to see who might be watching.
Elder Thomas began to raise his arm and then decided he wouldn’t do it either. No one was looking back. The people were stretching their arms, standing at attention. Elder Thomas saw the pride Herr Stoltz had talked about—people who wanted to take back their national spirit.
“This is crazy,” Elder Mecham whispered. “I can’t believe these are the same people we see in the market place. They’ve got fire in their eyes.”
Elder Thomas could see the thrilled faces across the street. After the flag passed by, people dropped their arms, but they began to shout and wave as the black-uniformed SS troops tromped by in their perfect lines, their legs rising in exact unison.
After the SS passed, several big trucks followed, filled with Storm Troopers in their brown shirts and Swastika armbands. They sat in rows, looking straight forward, with rifles held upright in front of them. Women in the crowd had begun to wave handkerchiefs, and gradually more appeared along the street, the white cloths fluttering in the cold wind.
“Look how the women are getting into this,” Elder Mecham whispered. “I didn’t expect that.”
“Watch the kids.”
Elder Thomas had always been amazed at the way the German children and teenagers, who usually seemed less demonstrative than American kids, would jump up and down in their excitement and creep out into the street just to be near the noise and the power of the trucks and tanks.
A band passed, and the noise became intense, the waving all the more ardent. Then a company of goose-stepping soldiers in gray uniforms marched through, followed by eight big tanks. The tanks made a terrific noise on the cobblestone street. The drivers stood with their shoulders above the open turrets. They didn’t wave, didn’t smile, but they looked exultant.
Behind the Panzers came a troop of Hitler Youth in their winter uniforms: long black pants, black coats with red swastika armbands, and black caps and gloves. They didn’t goose-step, but they were skillful marchers, and their devotion was clear in their stern faces, their tunneled eyes.
And then came the Bund Deutscher Mädel—”League of German Girls”—in their long coats and heavy marching shoes. Elder Thomas had seen the girls during the summer out on long hikes in their white blouses and blue skirts. Hitler wanted healthy women who would mother a great generation. The Third Reich was to stand for a thousand years, and it had to start with pure, robust parents. Elder Thomas had heard it all, read it. The propaganda was everywhere.
More soldiers in trucks came after that, and then half-tracks, a squadron of men on motorcycles, artillery pulled by giant horses, and Nazi party leaders in touring cars. And overhead, a flight of fighters and then of bombers buzzed low over the parade route. The crowd continued to cheer and wave.
“I just don’t believe this,” Elder Mecham kept mumbling.
Elder Thomas hadn’t wanted Elder Mecham to see too much of this kind of thing. Elder Thomas loved the Germans in the branches and the good people he met in their homes—people who saved their money to attend operas and concerts; people who loved books and nature, who spent their spare time in art museums or strolling in the woods. He didn’t know how to explain this seeming madness for weapons and military pomp.
“So. We meet again.”
Elder Thomas spun to his left. But he already knew the voice. It was Kellerman, the Gestapo agent. He was wearing his uniform and a black leather coat, but he had opened the coat and pulled it back so his nightstick was showing.
“Good day, Herr Kellerman.”
“Heil Hitler.” He gave a quick Nazi salute.
“Heil Hitler,” Elder Thomas said, and he raised his arm.
“How is it that you let our flag pass you by—at the beginning—and didn’t show it proper respect?” He had chosen to speak in German today. And he was looking at Elder Mecham. “A man who reports to me saw you and came to tell me. Needless to say, I was not surprised.”
“We weren’t certain what we should do,” Elder Thomas said.
“I don’t want to hear this again. You know exactly what you should do.” Kellerman spread his legs farther apart and placed his hands on his hips as though to look as large as he could.
“We will salute from this day on,” Elder Thomas said, and he tried to sound friendly, not defensive.
“Do it now. Show me. Say, ‘Heil Hitler.’” Elder Thomas raised his arm, but Kellerman said, “Not you. I want Herr Mecham to do it.” Kellerman looked up at Elder Mecham with hatred in his eyes. He had obviously been waiting for this moment.
Elder Mecham didn’t raise his arm and he didn’t answer.
“Do it,” Elder Thomas said, but Elder Mecham shook his head. So Elder Thomas turned to Kellerman. “I’ll talk to him. He hasn’t been in Germany very long. He doesn’t understand all your customs. But he’ll change his mind once I explain.”
“You are lying, Herr Thomas.” He looked at Elder Mecham. “I want to hear you say ‘Heil Hitler.’ And see you salute.”
Elder Mecham shook his head, slowly and resolutely.
Kellerman pulled his nightstick loose from his belt. “Do it now,” he said in English.
“No. I don’t have to do that.”
Suddenly the nightstick flashed, back-handed, directly into Elder Mecham’s face, catching him across the bridge of his nose. Elder Mecham spun away and grabbed his face. Another slashing blow caught him across the head, and he fell to his knees.
Elder Thomas dropped to the ground, grabbed his companion’s shoulder, and shielded him with his body from more blows. “Please don’t,” he pleaded. “That’s enough.”
Elder Thomas heard Elder Mecham whisper, “If I get up, I’ll kill him. Hold me down.” Elder Thomas tightened his grip.
“What did he say?” Kellerman demanded.
“He’s sorry. He said that he is sorry.”
“You lie. I heard him say ‘kill.’”
“No, no. He wouldn’t say that.”
“Get up. Both of you.”
Elder Thomas stood up, but Elder Mecham was still on all fours. “Get up, I said!” Kellerman shouted. Suddenly he thrust the toe of his boot hard into Elder Mecham’s side.
Elder Mecham took the blow with a grunt, but he hardly moved. Elder Thomas knelt next to him again. “Stand up,” he was pleading. And then to Kellerman, “He’ll get up now.”
And slowly Elder Mecham did climb to his feet. Blood was running down the sides of his nose onto his chin. He wiped his hand through it, smearing it across his lip and cheek. But then he stared into Kellerman’s eyes, looking more defiant than hurt.
“Apologize to me—and to my flag,” Kellerman said, in German. He looked excited, tense, ready to use the stick again.
Elder Mecham said nothing, but Elder Thomas only let a second or two pass before he said, “He doesn’t understand you.” And then in English, “Elder, you’ve got to say you’re sorry.”
Elder Mecham stood his ground, his jaw set.
“Just say you’re sorry.”
“Es tut mir leid,” Elder Mecham finally said, but his tone said, “Just try it again.”
Kellerman looked confused. He had clearly not expected this concession, however insincere. “I’m not finished with you,” he said. His thick lips tightened into a grim frown, but it all seemed an act. Under the surface was an obvious well of weakness. “You think you can defy the Führer, but you cannot. My leaders tell me you are harmless boys. But I know better. They will listen to me now. You haven’t heard the last from me.” He turned on his heels and marched away.
Elder Thomas looked toward the parade. More soldiers were passing by. But many of the people in the crowd had turned; they had been watching Kellerman. Elder Thomas thought he saw concern in their eyes, maybe even fear. They turned away when he looked at them.
“I should have broken his jaw,” Elder Mecham said.
“Come on, Elder. That’s not what we’re here for.”
“I’m not going to bow down to that guy, the way you did.”
Elder Thomas was frustrated, scared for what might happen if Elder Mecham couldn’t learn from this. But he was also ashamed of himself. He wished he hadn’t groveled before Kellerman.
“He broke my nose,” Elder Mecham said.
“Are you sure?”
“It doesn’t matter. It’s been broken before.”
Elder Thomas took his arm and turned him. “Oh, man, the back of your head is cut too. You’re bleeding pretty bad.” He reached in his back pocket for a handkerchief and handed it to Elder Mecham, who dabbed at his face and then at his head. “We’d better get home as fast as we can. Come on.”
Elder Mecham took a couple of steps and then said, “Don’t walk too fast. My side hurts.”
“I’ll bet he broke your ribs.”
“Maybe.” He was leaning forward, his eyes squinted and his jaw clamped tight. Elder Thomas heard a little grunt with each step he took. “Do you want to lean on me?”
“No. Let’s just get home.”
“How are you going to ride a bike?”
“I don’t know.”
“Let’s go to the Stoltzes. It’s a lot closer. Maybe they have something they can use to bandage your head.”
“They don’t want us there.”
“I know. But I don’t know what else to do. Do you want to go to a hospital?”
“No. The Stoltzes. But take it easy.”
Elder Mecham walked slowly, but he didn’t break step. He kept going all the way down the block and around the corner. Only on the stairs at the Stoltzes’ apartment did he show signs of weakening. The grunts turned into gasps. And then, as he stood at the door, waiting, he let himself slump over, one hand on his knee, the other against his side. The blood had stopped running down his face now, but it was caked on his cheeks and chin, and his hair was matted and dark red.
When the door came open, Frau Stoltz looked at Elder Thomas curiously. She was about to say something when she looked over at Elder Mecham and saw the blood. “God in heaven,” she gasped—words Elder Thomas had tried to teach her not to say. “What’s happened?” At the same time, she grabbed Elder Mecham by the arm and pulled him inside.
“Gestapo,” Elder Thomas said. “We didn’t salute.”
“Ach, Meine Güte, how can this be? Everything is crazy.” She pulled Elder Mecham on through the living room and into her kitchen. “Take your coat off. Bruder Thomas, help him.”
“He’s hurt here, too,” Elder Thomas said. He touched his own side. “In the ribs. The Gestapo agent kicked him.”
Frau Stoltz threw up her arms in disbelief, and then she disappeared, apparently to find what she needed. Elder Thomas did help Elder Mecham get his coat off, and then his suit coat, and now he could see that blood had been flowing down his neck, forming a huge stain on the back of his white shirt.
“Sit down,” Frau Stoltz shouted from another room. “Take your tie off.”
Elder Mecham seemed unready for that much movement. He did sit down, but he leaned forward and held his forehead with one hand and his side with the other.
Frau Stoltz came back with towels and rags and a little emergency kit. She went to work quickly. She cleaned up the blood, dabbed iodine into the wounds—the sting causing him to flinch—and she wr
apped his head tight with a white cloth. She taped a little bandage over the cut on his nose.
“Now, you must see a doctor,” she told him. “I don’t know what to do for your ribs. You might be injured inside.”
“No. I’m all right,” he told Elder Thomas, in English, as though German were too much effort at the moment. “I had some broken ribs before—from football. They heal up.”
“I think he needs to rest more than anything,” Elder Thomas told Frau Stoltz.
Elder Mecham agreed. He wrapped a towel around his head and shoulders so he wouldn’t stain anything, and then he walked to the living room and sat down in a big chair. “I’ll be all right in a few minutes,” he said. “Then we’ll walk home.”
Not five minutes later, he was breathing steadily, already falling asleep. But that was not a real surprise. Elder Mecham had been fighting to stay awake his whole mission. Every time Elder Thomas started a lesson, usually in a warm kitchen after fighting the cold outside, Elder Mecham’s head began to bob.
Frau Stoltz took the chance to ask more questions, and gradually she got most of the story out of Elder Thomas. He had only just finished his account when Anna came in, and she asked everything again. She seemed more alarmed than her mother, however. “They won’t let this drop,” she said. “Does the agent know your names?”
“Yes.”
She grimaced. “That worries me, Bruder Thomas.” She gave his name its English pronunciation, and Elder Thomas felt a familiarity that embarrassed him. He watched her eyes as she studied his. “They should stay here, no?” she said to her mother. “Until Papa gets home. He can tell them what to do.”
“Yes. It’s good,” Frau Stoltz said. “I’ll prepare something. Bruder Mecham will want food when he wakes up.”
“He always wants food,” Elder Thomas said, and he tried to laugh. He glanced at Anna, but she didn’t smile. Elder Thomas could see she was getting more frightened as she thought about the situation.
The afternoon passed slowly. Elder Mecham woke up before long, and the elders ate. But Elder Mecham was still hurting, and he didn’t have much to say, didn’t even eat much. He did describe his own anger, however, made his contempt for Kellerman more clear than Elder Thomas had. And Frau Stoltz and Anna only looked more worried after hearing it.
