And so, in the early morning of 6 February, Anton, van der Waals, as resistance man Lucas Spoor, hands the pistol to Gerrit. At the SD-headquarters, Schreieder and his colleagues anxiously await the outcome of their game of Russian roulette. Who will die?
Schreieder does not have to wait long for his bodies. Reydon ends up in hospital, critically wounded, but thankfully they can do a post-mortem on his wife’s body. Schreieder is very pleased when he receives the reports: the shots have indeed been fired with the pistol he had given his infiltrator. It is a shame that the general and his wife fell, but, he reasons, there are plenty of Dutch Nazis left.
When Anton van der Waals comes to his boss to report, an unpleasant surprise awaits: Schreieder does not want to arrest Kastein. Quite the opposite, he wants Van der Waals to bond with Kastein and gather more information on actions and comrades in the resistance. Van der Waals, having witnessed the cool-headedness of Kastein, does not like this idea at all. He might be a productive traitor; he is not a very courageous one. He fears he might end up losing this game. Van der Waals tries to convince Schreieder, but his superior will not even consider putting the operation on hold. Indeed, he sees it as an interesting confrontation between his top infiltrator and that fanatical communist Kastein. If Anton comes off worst, that will be the conclusion and solution in one.
On 19 February 1943, Van der Waals has a new appointment with Gerrit Kastein and, there, the problem solves itself – an SD-assault squad arrests Kastein just before they are due to meet. Schreieder is furious and suspects his cowardly spy is playing him off against someone else.
Meanwhile, Kastein is clapped in irons and lead to a service car that takes him to the Binnenhof, where the headquarters of both Sicherheitzpolizei and SD are located; the political investigation department and the secret service.
But Gerrit is considered a formidable opponent for a reason; he will not have the Germans transport him meek as a lamb. When he gets out at Parliament Square in the Binnenhof, he sees his chance: with his hands cuffed he fires a small calibre gun from a special inside pocket in his trousers. One officer is hit in his leg, another bullet ricochets before they can snatch the pistol from him.
Inside, four men are already waiting to question Gerrit. After a while two officers leave to get coffee and the third to use the bathroom. One SD-man is a joke to Kastein. He floors him, kicks down the window and jumps from the second floor.
Aged thirty-two, the doctor is brought down after all, as his head hits the cobbles of the Binnenhof – on the exact same spot where, one week before, the first victim on his list, Lieutenant-General Seyffardt, beneath a row of outstretched arms, received a grand funeral.
At The High Nest everyone is devastated by the news. Bob comes home from his work at the food office in Weesp to find them sitting in the dusky front room with tight, pale faces. Janny takes her husband aside and tells him what happened. Bob and Gerrit were close friends from the communist circuit. When Janny shares the story of Gerrit’s death, the bizarre circumstances of the accident, Bob’s briefcase almost slips out of his hand. Of course they knew Gerrit carried out dangerous orders for the Party and played a crucial part in the assaults on Dutch collaborators, but in some strange way they had imagined him untouchable.
After dinner, when the children have gone to bed, they reminisce about Gerrit. They talk about the years of the Spanish Civil War, his work in the resistance, the sections he brought together since the occupation began. About his strategic insight and organizational talent, which were never an excuse to not dirty his own hands.
They also speculate about his motive for jumping out of the window. Most likely, Gerrit had tried to outwit the enemy one more time; the injuries of the fall would have forced them to take him to hospital, where perhaps he could have escaped. Not only because it was a different location with new circumstances, but also because he, as a neurologist, knew the way there. He did not care about wrecking his body, his mind was what he needed to preserve for the battle. But he took such a nasty fall on that damned Binnenhof that he did not live to tell his tale.
Gerrit’s death is tangible proof of the new phase the occupation has reached: on either side more victims will follow at alarming speed.
Shortly before Mik leaves for Amsterdam, he takes Lien and Eberhard, Janny and Bob aside in the hall. Serious eyes in a youthful face; the war pressing heavier than time.
‘Be careful not to take too many people in. It might go wrong eventually.’
‘Mik,’ Lien responds indignantly, ‘if someone is in need, we have no other option but to help him!’
‘I just want to warn you: be cautious.’
They kiss Mik goodbye, a last embrace, and follow him with their eyes as he walks down the garden path, into the dark forest.
Summer arrives. The new residents of The High Nest have never seen this spectacle before; it is breathtaking, like fireworks. They move around the grounds, admiring it from different angles each time. The grass turns thick and green, and it feels like a velvet carpet underneath their feet. They pack lunch in a large basket and settle down somewhere on the large lawn almost every day. The rhododendrons, the fig at the front of the house, the blackberry bushes on the side, the pear trees and apple trees in the orchard at the back, the rose bushes crawling up the shed, the beech hedge protecting the garden against wild animals – rather unsuccessfully – the weeds growing to shoulder level in just one night, the vine with its sprouting tendrils, the trees all around folding out like umbrellas, the deep purple heather in the distance, and the water of the IJsselmeer shimmers like a thousand tiny mirrors glued together as one. It is a constantly changing show, free and for their eyes only.
Each morning, Joseph and Fietje sit down on a bench at the side of the house with a cup of tea, huddling closely together. They don’t speak as much any more and mainly try to make themselves useful in the enormous household. It is a bit like working in the shop: the stock, the coupons, the shopping, the consumption, the kitchen duties and other chores. Since the temperature carefully crept above 18 degrees, they sit here for a short while each morning, catching the first sunshine, listening to birdsong. The stone wall safely at their back, the thatched roof fatherly above their head, the shell path at the front a crackling alarm in case anyone is approaching.
Reports from the rest of the country are alarming. The ‘evacuation’ of Jews is running smoothly; the provinces of Friesland, Groningen, Drenthe, Overijssel, Gelderland, Limburg, Zeeland and North Brabant have all been declared judenrein. On the other hand: the battle at the Eastern Front takes longer and is a lot tougher than Hitler had anticipated. German reserves are seriously affected and from the summer of 1943 onwards, the Red Army keeps pushing the Germans further back.
This unfortunately has consequences for the Netherlands: to produce military equipment and supplies, the Nazis need more workmen. From May 1943 onwards, all men between the ages of eighteen and thirty-five must report for Arbeitseinsatz, forced labour, in Germany. Neglecting the call is punishable and large-scale raids will follow to send more young men to the Third Reich. Those reluctant to report go into hiding too – fear and chaos are now everywhere.
The streets of Amsterdam have changed beyond recognition in just a few years. The historical centre has not been destroyed, as it has in Rotterdam, and the river still streams stoically from Centraal Station to Carré Theatre, but most of the people who coloured the city are gone. The merchants, the workmen and the clerks; the actors and the musicians, the intellectuals and the night owls; the librarians, the slurring regular and the quiet zookeeper – with tens of thousands of others at the time, they were taken out of their homes, put on the train, transported to Westerbork, as simple as that. A quick change trick has taken place in the Zentralstelle für Jüdische Auswanderung, where the index cards of registered Jews are kept. The ‘Amsterdam’ box has almost emptied over the course of 1943.
The last large raids are held in May and June. On 26 May, the Jews from the city
centre are rounded up at Muiderpoort station. Children pressing their favourite toys to their chest, women wearing beautiful hats, men in their best clothes, grandmothers with freshly curled hair. After hours of waiting a train arrives to take them to Westerbork. Storm, the SS weekly, reports extensively on the event in its 4 June edition:
We have had to say goodbye, goodbye to people who have ‘shared’ our bread for centuries, always keeping the best pieces for themselves. We have sent them off and bid them a last farewell in Amsterdam-East, at the Polderweg site. They were wearing badges, six-pointed stars, proving their membership of the party travelling to Poland [. . .] The amount of blood as yet contaminated by Jews, the amount of bastards walking our streets could only be understood upon witnessing these scenes. Dead numbers came to life. Practice confirmed science. Worse even. We were heading towards the creation of a nice blond type of Jew with almost Aryan features. There they were, those Jewish men and women. A well-known fair-haired woman was there, platinum blonde, so no one would suspect her Jewish blood. Dozens of them there could easily have married a nice Aryan boy, without him realizing he was marrying a Jew. There was a danger there and that danger was very large. It is a good thing active measures were taken. And thus the Jews have gone. We saw them leave on the trains. We were not sad to part.
On Sunday, 20 June 1943, the large raid in Amsterdam-South and Amsterdam-East follows. The last Jews above ground are deported to Westerbork that very same day, five and a half thousand in total. They are followed, in September, by the members of the Jewish Council, which then officially ceases to exist.
On 1 October, the Henneicke Column with its Jew hunters is disbanded and the very last transportation with Jews, drawn out of their hiding places, leaves the capital on 19 November 1943. Less than three and a half years after Heeresgruppe B invaded the Netherlands under the command of General Fedor von Bock, Amsterdam is judenrein.
6
Unwelcome Encounters
Panic in The High Nest. The Jansen sisters intend to pay them a visit. It is the height of summer, a time usually spent in their country house in nature, not in the stuffy city; they are desperate for a day out. Of course another – unmentioned – reason for coming over is to see if their house and garden are treated well.
After the alarming phone call, they have a few days to get ready. Mother and Lien set everyone to work cleaning, while the men start dragging mattresses away and reorganize beds, cupboards, chairs and tables, making it seem as if only two families, the official tenants, live there with their children: Janny and Bob with Robbie and Liselotte, and Lien and Eberhard with little Kathinka.
On the day the visitors are expected, the illegal residents are hidden in the forest like Easter eggs. They will use special signs when everyone can reappear. Thankfully, it is a warm day.
The tram delivers the ladies right on time at the stop closest to the villa and when they arrive at The High Nest, they receive the warmest welcome. The sun is shining brightly and the house upon the hill, surrounded by a sea of flowers, is basking in its light.
Lien and Janny take the sisters inside, to the living room, for the next scene in this absurd play. Indeed, such a delight to live here, changing of the seasons simply overwhelming, no problems with the rent hopefully, and perhaps would they like something to drink?
They do. Enter Red Puck to perform another audacious act. Lien rings a little bell and the maid arrives wearing a starched white apron and a cap, carrying a silver tray with a teapot, cups and a plateful of cookies. Puck, her fiery hair bound sideways in two braids, curtsies while Janny and Lien bite their lip so as not to burst out laughing.
‘Afternoon, madam,’ she greets the visitors twice. ‘Do you take milk or sugar?’
Puck neatly pours the tea as the Jansen sisters watch her, visibly impressed and curious.
‘Are you from around here, girl?’
‘Yes, madam.’
‘What’s your name, then?’
‘Aagje Honing, madam.’
One of the sisters puts down her cup on a side table and claps her hands with joy.
‘How lovely! We know the Honing family in Huizen! Are you related to Auntie Betsie Honing?’
Puck doesn’t flinch. ‘I’m afraid I’m not, madam. There are two Honing families here.’
Lien quickly steers the conversation in a different direction while Janny rushes Puck out of the room.
‘Well,’ Lien says softly, pointing at her temple, ‘the child is a bit simple, but ever so diligent and sweet.’
After tea, the ladies want to have a look around the house. Visibly pleased, they pass the shiny, clean kitchen and the fresh hall and walk upstairs, where there is not a trace of little children playing, let alone dozens of people sleeping, in any of the rooms. Downstairs, they have a look at the antique cupboard with the expensive porcelain service.
Janny and Lien hold their breath. This winter one of their guests had pushed a pile of crockery through the kitchen hatch with a little too much force. It landed on the other side with a loud bang, shattering into a thousand pieces on the wooden floor. It was as if the pressure in the entire house completely dropped, they were in such shock. The noise seemed to break straight through the walls and echo between the trees. When, after an eternity, neither Germans nor Dutch Nazis appeared at the door, they all stood there laughing nervously before getting on their knees to collect the shards. From that moment, Janny and Lien made a game out of picking up china – begging and stealing – anywhere they went. Each new plate they dug up from their handbag and added to the multicoloured collection in the cupboard was welcomed with cheers.
But now the Jansen sisters are staring into the same cupboard with narrowed eyes. Lien placed the remaining cups and saucers from the original service at the front to cover the mishmash of porcelain replacements behind them. If they make it through the war alive, they will repay all of it and more – for now, this beautiful display will have to do.
The Jansen sisters turn around, smiling broadly at Janny and Lien, who smile back with their buttocks clenched.
After a few exhausting hours of sitting outside on a bench in the sun, watching the shadow move across the grass stalk by stalk, the ladies finally get up, smooth down their skirts and say a fond farewell. Janny and Lien wave them goodbye from the hill, laugh off their nerves and then hurry into the forest to free everyone from their hiding places.
Summer seems to last forever. Lien and Eberhard focus on the house concerts, developing new shows and writing articles for The Free Artist; Janny and Bob work hard for the resistance. On top of that they have the daily shop, a full-time job in itself.
The constant threat becomes the new norm. They are less keen to listen to the radio and hardly speak about the so-called progress of the Allied forces. They all try to find an internal pause button enabling them to survive this uncertainty. One year ago, most of them were firmly convinced the war would be over by now. That they would have returned to their own homes, shops and jobs. That they, if only they hadn’t lost anyone, could resume the thread of their lives. But so many family members and friends have been deported to an unknown destination. They can only endure all of this by focusing on the horizon. Stop dreaming. Think in terms of months instead of days.
Janny has never longed for winter, cold, darkness and short days before, but now they seem like an attractive hole in which to disappear. She cannot wait for summer to be over; the sun drives everyone outside and there are more people on the streets, in the villages, on the train. The colours and warmth all around make the residents of The Nest feel dangerously carefree, careless even, while the enemy is no less ruthless. Among each other, they keep insisting: you must trust no one.
One day, Eberhard is walking towards Huizen with Kathinka. As Father Bos and his daughter, both very blond, they are relatively free to go where they want. They are walking hand in hand across Naarderstraat, when a troop of German soldiers turns the corner and heads straight towards them. Their knees move u
p as one and the road seems to tremble as their boots all hit the ground.
Eberhard freezes and squeezes Kathinka’s hand. They are trapped. The next side street is past the soldiers and turning their back on them is not an option. All they can do is walk on. Eberhard breathes out softly, drops his shoulders, trying not to let anything show to Kathinka, happily skipping along by his side.
The unit is only a few dozen feet away from them and led by an officer. When their eyes meet, Eberhard stands rooted to the spot and jerks Kathinka’s arm backwards. The officer is his old friend Kurt Kahle.
The man looks away, leading his German men past father and daughter as if they do not exist, but Eberhard realizes this is the end. For him and everyone else in The High Nest. There is no doubt Kurt recognized him and, any second now, he will have them arrested. Kathinka is talking to her father, pulling his arm, but he presses his hand against her mouth and stares at the soldiers’ backs. They march on with Eberhard watching until the ground beneath his feet has stopped trembling and the men become black dots, dissolving in purple heather.
As soon as his knees are willing to move, he runs back home with Kathinka to warn the others.
Kurt Kahle was part of their artistic group of friends in Amsterdam. A photographer from Berlin who, like so many other Germans, fled the rise of National Socialism and came to the Netherlands in the early 1930s. Kurt was one of the people walking in and out of Mik’s place at Keizersgracht. He and Eberhard became friends, discussing recent developments in their fatherland – they were both extremely outraged, then.
Eberhard thinks back on his own call from the Wehrmacht to join them. The conversations with Lien, the fear, the doubt, Rhijn, the failed starvation cure and then the most important question of his life: to desert or not. Fahnenflucht. Kurt received the same call and faced the same decision. Can Eberhard hold it against him that he turned another way?
The Sisters of Auschwitz Page 15
