I didn’t understand what I was seeking with this young woman; but I didn’t try to understand it. What I liked about her was her gentleness, a gentleness I thought existed only in the paintings of Vermeer of Delft, through which could clearly be felt the supple force of a steel blade. I had enjoyed that afternoon very much, and for now I didn’t look any further, I didn’t want to think. I felt that thinking would immediately have led to painful questions and demands: for once, I didn’t feel the need, I was happy to let myself be carried by the course of events, as I was by Monteverdi’s music, at once utterly lucid and emotional, and then we’d see. During the week that followed, in the slack moments during work, or at night, at home, the thought of her grave face or of the calmness of her smile came back to me, almost warm, a friendly, affectionate thought, which didn’t alarm me.
But the past is a thing that, once it has sunk its teeth into your flesh, doesn’t let go. Around the middle of the week after the air raids, Fräulein Praxa knocked on my office door. “Obersturmbannführer? There are two gentlemen from the Kripo who would like to see you.” I was immersed in a particularly complex report; annoyed, I replied, “Well, let them do what everyone else does: make an appointment.”—“Very well, Obersturmbannführer.” She closed the door. A minute later she knocked again: “Excuse me, Obersturmbannführer. They insist. They said to tell you that it’s about a personal matter. They say it concerns your mother.” I breathed in deeply and closed my file: “Show them in, then.”
The two men who pushed their way into my office were genuine policemen, not honorary ones like Thomas. They wore long gray overcoats made of coarse, stiff wool, probably woven with wood pulp, and held their hats in their hands. They hesitated and then raised their arms, saying, “Heil Hitler!” I returned their salute and motioned them to the sofa. They introduced themselves: Kriminalkommissar Clemens and Kriminalkommissar Weser, from Referat V B 1, “Einsatz/Capital Crimes.” “In fact,” said one of them, possibly Clemens, by way of introduction, “we’re acting at the request of the Five A One, which is in charge of international cooperation. They received a request for legal assistance from the French police…”—“Excuse me,” I interrupted curtly, “can I see your papers?” They handed me their ID cards along with a mission order signed by a Regierungsrat Galzow, assigning them the task of replying to questions sent to the German police by the Prefect of the Alpes-Maritimes in the context of an investigation into the murders of Moreau, Aristide, and his wife, Moreau, Héloïse, formerly Frau. Aue, née C. “So you’re investigating my mother’s death,” I said, returning their documents. “How does that concern the German police? They were killed in France.”—“True, true,” said the second one, probably Weser. The first one pulled a notebook out of his pocket and leafed through it. “It was a very violent murder, apparently,” he said. “A madman, possibly, a sadist. You must have been very upset.” My voice remained dry and hard: “Kriminalkommissar, I am aware of what happened. My personal reactions are my business. Why are you coming to see me?”—“We’d like to ask you a few questions,” said Weser.—“As a potential witness,” Clemens added.—“A witness of what?” I asked. He looked me straight in the eyes: “You saw them at the time, didn’t you?” I too continued staring at him: “That’s right. You’re well informed. I went to visit them. I don’t know exactly when they were killed, but it was soon afterward.” Clemens examined his notebook, then showed it to Weser. Weser went on: “According to the Gestapo in Marseille, a travel pass was issued to you for the Italian zone on April twenty-sixth. How long did you stay at your mother’s house?”—“Just a day.”—“Are you sure?” Clemens asked.—“I think so. Why?” Weser again consulted Clemens’s notebook: “According to the French police, a gendarme saw an SS officer leaving Antibes in a bus on the morning of the twenty-ninth. There weren’t many SS officers in the sector, and they certainly weren’t traveling by bus.”—“I may have stayed two nights. I traveled a lot, at the time. Is it important?”—“It could be. The bodies were discovered on May first, by a milkman. They weren’t very fresh. The coroner estimated the time of death at sixty to eighty-four hours prior, that is sometime between the night of the twenty-eighth and the night of the twenty-ninth.”—“Well, I can tell you that when I left them they were very much alive.”—“So,” said Clemens, “if you left on the morning of the twenty-ninth, they would have been killed during the day.”—“That’s possible. I never asked myself the question.”—“How did you learn of their deaths?”—“I was informed by my sister.” “In fact,” said Weser, still leaning over to look at Clemens’s notebook, “she arrived almost right away. On May second, to be precise. Do you know how she learned the news?”—“No.”—“Have you seen her again since?” asked Clemens.—“No.”—“Where is she now?” asked Weser.—“She lives with her husband in Pomerania. I can give you the address, but I don’t know if they’re there. They often go to Switzerland.” Weser took the notebook from Clemens and jotted something down. Clemens asked me: “You’re not in touch with her?”—“Not very often,” I replied.—“And your mother, did you see her often?” asked Weser. They seemed systematically to take turns talking, and this little game was grating on my nerves. “Not much, either,” I replied as dryly as possible.—“So,” said Clemens, “you’re not very close to your family.”—“Meine Herren, I’ve already told you, I’m not about to talk to you about my inner feelings. I don’t see how my relations with my family can concern you.”—“When there’s murder, Herr Obersturmbannführer,” Weser said sententiously, “anything can concern the police.” They really did look like a pair of cops from an American movie. But they probably acted that way on purpose. “This Herr Moreau was your stepfather by marriage, isn’t that right?” Weser continued.—“Yes. He married my mother in…1929, I think. Or maybe ’twenty-eight.”—“1929, that’s right,” Weser said, studying his notebook.—“Are you aware of his last will?” Clemens abruptly asked. I shook my head: “Not at all. Why?”—“Herr Moreau wasn’t poor,” said Weser. “You’ll probably inherit a tidy little sum.”—“That would surprise me. My stepfather and I didn’t get along at all.”—“That’s possible,” Clemens continued, “but he had no children, and no brothers or sisters. If he died intestate, you and your sister will share everything.”—“I hadn’t even thought about it,” I said sincerely. “But instead of pointlessly speculating, tell me: did they find a will?” Weser leafed through the notebook: “Actually, we don’t know that yet.”—“Well,” I declared, “no one has contacted me about it.” Weser scribbled a note in the notebook. “Another question, Herr Obersturmbannführer: there were two children at Herr Moreau’s house. Twins. Alive.”—“I saw those children. My mother told me they were a friend’s. Do you know who they are?”—“No,” Clemens grumbled. “Apparently the French don’t know, either.”—“Did they witness the murder?”—“They never opened their mouths,” said Weser.—“They might have seen something,” added Clemens.—“But they didn’t want to talk,” repeated Weser.—“Maybe they were shocked,” Clemens explained.—“And what’s become of them?” I asked.—“Actually,” Weser replied, “that’s the curious thing. Your sister took them with her.”—“We don’t really understand why,” said Clemens.—“Or how.” “What’s more, it seems highly irregular,” Weser commented.—“Highly,” Clemens repeated. “But at the time, the Italians were running things there. With them anything is possible.”—“Yes, absolutely anything,” Weser added. “Except an investigation by the rules.”—“It’s the same thing with the French, too,” Clemens went on.—“Yes, they’re the same,” Weser confirmed. “It’s no pleasure working with them.”—“Meine Herren,” I interrupted. “That’s all very well, but how does it concern me?” Clemens and Weser looked at each other. “You see, I’m very busy right now. Unless you have other specific questions, I think we can leave things there?” Clemens nodded; Weser leafed through the notebook and returned it to him. Then he got up: “Excuse us, Herr Obersturmbannführer.”—“Yes,”
said Clemens, getting up in turn. “Excuse us. For now, that’s all.”—“Yes,” Weser went on, “that’s all. Thank you for your cooperation.” I held out my hand: “Not at all. If you have other questions, don’t hesitate to contact me.” I took some business cards from my stand and gave one to each. “Thank you,” Weser said, pocketing the card. Clemens examined his own: “Special representative of the Reichsführer-SS for the Arbeitseinsatz,” he read. “What is that?”—“That’s a State secret, Kriminalkommissar,” I replied.—“Oh. I’m sorry.” They both saluted and headed for the door. Clemens, who was a good head taller than Weser, opened it and went out; Weser paused on the threshold and turned around: “Excuse me, Herr Obersturmbannführer. I forgot one detail.” He turned around: “Clemens! The notebook.” He leafed through it again. “Oh yes, here it is: When you went to visit your mother, were you in uniform or in civilian clothes?”—“I don’t remember. Why? Is it important?”—“Probably not. The Obersturmführer in Marseille who issued the travel pass thought you were in civilian clothes.”—“That’s possible. I was on leave.” He nodded: “Thank you. If there’s anything else, we’ll call you. Forgive us for coming like this. Next time we’ll make an appointment.”
This visit left me with a bad taste in my mouth. What did these two characters want with me? They had struck me as very aggressive, insinuating. Of course I had lied to them: but if I had told them I had seen the bodies, that would have created all kinds of complications. I didn’t have the impression that they suspected me on this point; their suspicion seemed systematic, an occupational trait, probably. I had found their questions about the Moreau legacy unpleasant: they seemed to be suggesting that I might have had a motive, a pecuniary interest, it was ridiculous. Could they possibly suspect me of murder? I tried to remember the conversation, and had to acknowledge that it was possible. I found that frightening, but the mind of a career policeman must be made that way. Another question worried me even more: Why had my sister taken the twins away? What relationship was there between them and her? All that, I must say, troubled me deeply. I found it almost unfair: just at the moment when my life seemed finally to be headed for a kind of equilibrium, a feeling of normality, almost like anyone else’s life, those idiotic cops came to stir up questions, give rise to anxieties, questions without answers. The most logical thing, actually, would have been to call or write to my sister, to ask her what the story was with those twins, and also to be sure, if ever those policemen came to question her, that her story didn’t contradict my own, on the point where I had deemed it necessary to dissimulate part of the truth. Yet, I didn’t really know why, I didn’t do so right away; it’s not that something held me back, but rather that I didn’t want to hurry. Telephoning wasn’t a difficult thing, I could do it when I wanted, no need to rush.
What’s more, I was very busy. My team in Oranienburg, which, under Asbach’s direction, continued to grow, regularly sent me summaries of its research on the foreign workers, what was called the Ausländereinsatz. These workers were divided into a number of categories, based on racial criteria, with different levels of treatment; they also included prisoners of war from Western countries (but not the Soviet KGF, a separate category, completely under control of the OKW). The day after the visit of the two inspectors, I was summoned to the Reichsführer’s office; he was interested in the subject. I gave a rather long, but complete, presentation, for the problem was complex: the Reichsführer listened almost wordlessly, inscrutable beneath his little steel-rimmed glasses. At the same time, I had to prepare Speer’s visit to Mittelbau, and I went to Lichterfelde—after the raids, cruel Berlin tongues called the neighborhood Trichterfelde, the “crater meadow”—to have the project explained to me by Brigadeführer Kammler, the head of Amtsgruppe C (“Construction”) of the WVHA. Kammler, an abrupt, nervous, precise man whose rapid-fire speech and quick gestures masked an inflexible will, spoke to me—and this was the first time I heard something other than rumors about this subject—about the A-4 rocket, a miraculous weapon that according to him would irreversibly change the course of the war as soon as it could be mass-produced. The English had caught wind of its existence and, in August, had bombed the secret installations where it was being developed, on the north of the island of Usedom, where my convalescence had been spent. Three weeks later, the Reichsführer suggested to the Führer and to Speer that the installations be transferred underground and their secrecy guaranteed by using solely concentration camp inmates for their construction. Kammler himself had picked the site, underground galleries in the Harz Mountains, used by the Wehrmacht to store fuel reserves. A company had been formed to manage the project, Mittelwerke GmbH, under the control of Speer’s ministry; the SS, however, maintained complete responsibility for designing the premises as well as for on-site security. “The assembly of rockets has already begun, even though the installations aren’t finished; the Reichsminister should be satisfied.”—“I just hope that the working conditions for the inmates are adequate, Brigadeführer,” I replied. “I know that’s a constant concern of the Reichsminister’s.”—“The conditions are what they are, Obersturmbannführer. It’s war, after all. But I can assure you that the Reichsminister won’t have any reason to complain about the level of productivity. The factory is under my personal control, I myself chose the Kommandant, an efficient man. The RSHA doesn’t give me any problems, either: I sent one of my own men, Dr. Bischoff, to supervise production security and prevent sabotage. Up to now, there haven’t been any problems. Anyway,” he added, “I inspected several KLs with subordinates of Reichsminister Speer’s, in April and May; they didn’t have too many complaints, and Mittelbau is no worse than Auschwitz.”
The visit took place on a Friday in December. It was bitterly cold. Speer was accompanied by specialists from his ministry. His special plane, a Heinkel, took us as far as Nordhausen; there, a delegation from the camp led by Kommandant Förschner welcomed us and escorted us to the site. The road, barred by numerous SS checkpoints, ran alongside the south side of the Harz; Förschner explained to us that the entire mountain chain had been declared a no-entry zone; other underground projects had been launched a little farther north, in Mittelbau satellite camps; in Dora itself, the northern sections of the two tunnels had been allocated for the manufacture of Junker airplane engines. Speer listened to his explanations without saying anything. The road led to a large dirt plaza; on one side were lined up the barracks of the SS guards and of the Kommandantur; opposite, cluttered with piles of construction materials and covered with camouflage nets, recessed beneath a ridge planted with pine trees, gaped the entrance to the first tunnel. We entered it behind Förschner and some engineers from Mittelwerke. Gypsum dust and the acrid smoke of industrial explosives caught my throat; mixed in with them were other indefinable odors, sweet and nauseating, which reminded me of my first camp visits. As we advanced, the Häftlinge, alerted by the Spiess who preceded the delegation, lined up at attention and removed their caps. Most were horribly thin; their heads, balanced precariously on scrawny necks, looked like hideous balls decorated with enormous noses and ears cut out of cardboard; they were set with immense, empty eyes that refused to rest on you. Close to them, the smells I had noticed upon entering became a rank stench that emanated from their dirty clothes, their wounds, their very bodies. Many of Speer’s men, green, were holding handkerchiefs to their faces; Speer kept his hands behind his back and examined everything with a closed, tense look. Connecting the two main tunnels, A and B, transverse galleries were spaced out every twenty-five meters: the first of them revealed rows of bunk beds made of coarse wood, four levels high, from which, under cudgel blows of an SS noncom, there tumbled down to come stand at attention a swarming horde of ragged inmates, most of them naked or almost naked, some with their legs stained with shit. The bare concrete ceilings were sweating with humidity. In front of the bunks, at the intersection of the main tunnel, large metal barrels, cut in half lengthwise and placed on their sides, served as latrines; they wer
e almost overflowing with a yellow, green, brown, stinking liquid. One of Speer’s assistants exclaimed: “But it’s Dante’s Inferno!” Another, standing a little back, was vomiting against the wall. I too felt the old nausea returning, but I held myself in and breathed in long hisses, between my teeth. Speer turned to Förschner: “Do the inmates live here?”—“Yes, Herr Reichsminister.”—“They never go outside?”—“No, Herr Reichsminister.” As we continued advancing, Förschner explained to Speer that he lacked everything and that he was incapable of ensuring the requisite sanitary conditions; epidemics were decimating the inmates. He even showed us a few corpses piled in front of the perpendicular galleries, naked or covered with a loose canvas tarp, human skeletons with ravaged skin. In one of the dormitory-galleries, soup was being served: Speer asked to taste it. He swallowed his spoonful, then had me taste it in turn; I had to force myself not to spit it out; it was a bitter, revolting gruel; it tasted like boiled weeds; even at the bottom of the pot, there was almost nothing solid. We visited the entire length of the tunnel this way, up to the Junker factory, wading through the mud and the refuse, breathing with difficulty, in the midst of thousands of Häftlinge who mechanically presented themselves one after the other, their faces stripped of the slightest expression. I examined their badges: aside from Germans, mostly “greens,” there were “reds” there from every country in Europe, Frenchmen, Belgians, Italians, Dutchmen, Czechs, Poles, Russians, and even Spaniards, republicans interned in France after their defeat (but of course there were no Jews: at that time, Jewish workers were still forbidden in Germany). In the transverse galleries, after the dormitories, inmates supervised by civil engineers worked on the components and assembly of the rockets; farther on, in a deafening din and in a thick cloud of dust, a veritable ant battalion was digging new galleries and emptying the stones into dump carts pushed by other inmates on hastily installed tracks. As we left, Speer asked to see the Revier; it was an extremely makeshift installation, with room for about forty men at the most. The chief physician showed him the mortality and morbidity statistics: dysentery, typhus, and tuberculosis especially wrought havoc. Outside, in the face of the whole delegation, Speer exploded with a contained but virulent rage: “Obersturmbannführer Förschner! This factory is a scandal! I’ve never seen anything like it. How can you hope to work properly with men in that condition?” Förschner, under the invective, had instinctively stood at attention. “Herr Reichsminister,” he replied, “I’m ready to improve the conditions, but I’m not given the means. I can’t be held responsible.” Speer was white as a sheet. “Very well,” he barked. “I order you to have a camp built immediately, here, outside, with showers and toilets. Have the papers for the allocation of materials drawn up for me immediately and I will sign them before I leave.” Förschner led us to the barracks of the Kommandantur and gave the necessary orders. While Speer talked with his aides and the engineers, I, furious, took Förschner aside: “I asked you expressly in the Reichsführer’s name to make sure the camp was presentable. This is a Schweinerei.” Förschner didn’t let himself get flustered: “Obersturmbannführer, you know as well as I do that an order without the means to carry it out isn’t worth much. I’m sorry, but I have no magic wand. I had the galleries washed this morning, but I couldn’t do anything else. If the Reichsminister provides us with construction materials, so much the better.” Speer had joined us: “I’ll see to it that the camp receives additional rations.” He turned to a civil engineer who was standing next to him: “Sawatsky, it goes without saying that the inmates under your orders will have priority. We cannot demand complex assembly labor from the sick and dying.” The civilian nodded: “Of course, Herr Reichsminister. It’s especially the turnover that’s becoming unmanageable. We have to replace them so often that it’s impossible to train them correctly.” Speer turned to Förschner: “That doesn’t mean that you should neglect the ones who are assigned to the construction of the galleries. You will also increase their rations, insofar as possible. I’ll talk about it to Brigadeführer Kammler.”—“Zu Befehl, Herr Reichsminister,” said Förschner. His expression remained opaque, closed; Sawatsky looked happy. Outside, some of Speer’s men were waiting for us, scribbling in notebooks and greedily breathing in the cold air. I shivered: winter had set in.
The Kindly Ones Page 87
