The Edit Page 19

  “You’re wrong about me. You wrote when I first went out into the compound that I’d be like all the rest. Pressing my face against the cyclone fence and no longer seeing it as a prison but as a refuge from the world. That’s not me. I’ll never be like that.”

  “I was generalizing from what I witnessed at Mauthausen.”

  “It won’t happen to me. I won’t let it.”

  “Eat. I brought you something to read.”

  “And I you. We’ll trade. Mine’s a new story. What’s yours? Records? Forms? This is your SS history. You’re going to do it like this in the book? And that’s all?”

  “What more do I need? What more do others want to see?”

  “But where is the heart of it?”

  “Metafiction, Miss O’Brien.”

  “But this isn’t fiction. It’s your life. It’s your only chance to tell your side of things as fully as possible. Don’t you care about that?”

  “—”

  “Isn’t there any more?”

  “More of what?”

  “For example, look at your promotion record. While in Berlin you skyrocketed. Promotion after promotion in a couple of years. But all the time in Vienna and Mauthausen you only get three. Why? What happened? Did you top out? Did you fuck up? What the hell happened? Tell us the story of that.”

  “Hardly a story. Or hardly worth telling. Mainly it has to do with Ricardo Klement—”

  “Alias Adolf Eichmann.”

  “Another surprise. You do know our history.”

  “It was on the news nightly when I was a kid. The gray-faced man behind the protective glass. Speaking German in that irritating monotone and the rather too animated tones of the interpreter. The men and women weeping in the courtroom as evidence was given.”

  “Yes. To be sure. But what I refer to was all my years prior to ‘justice in Jerusalem.’ My years in Berlin were productive because I was not yet directly subordinate to Eichmann. My superior in Berlin, Jost, was only too glad to receive some bright suggestion from his junior officer. Those were the years of intensification vis-à-vis the camps.”

  “You mean the building of the concentration camps?”

  “Yes. And it was an organizational nightmare, I can tell you. The pure numbers alone were mind-boggling. I was always rather good at such things, schedules and the like. But in my Berlin years I learned I had another talent, one more, shall we say, of a psychological nature. The very name of the camps tells a lot. Concentration. Thousands of Jews, Marxists, Gypsies, and other enemies of the state were concentrated in one spot. So we in the Staffel and SD, though not directly responsible for the administration of the camp system, were up to our necks in the actual day-to-day running of them. And with such a concentration of bodies, one had recourse to devising control mechanisms. After all, we could hardly spare enough Waffen Schutzstaffel from frontline duty to patrol the camps if the inmates became truly desperate. They outnumbered us quite significantly. And it thus fell partly to me to devise strategies whereby the inmates would not become desperate.”

  “Strategies?”

  “Gambits. Psychological tricks, as it were. It was imperative that neither the inmates nor their relatives and friends should have doubts about what resettlement meant. If the fever and contagion of fear broke out among the Jews of Europe, then our entire enterprise could have broken down.”

  “Enterprise? You mean the Final Solution.”

  “Yes.”

  “You admit to it, then? The reality of the Holocaust. You won’t play games with history like the French revisionists, claiming it was all Allied propaganda.”

  “As I said earlier, I was not of the highest level of the bearer of secrets. I had my suspicions, certainly. But all I knew for certain was the task set for me. If the Jews of Europe suspected the nature of the Final Solution, it would make rounding them up a near impossibility. Transport to the camps would become an exercise in hell, and life inside the camps themselves would be one of constant warfare. My job in Berlin was to see that such would not be the case. And I confess I did quite well. And my exertions were appreciated. Once in Vienna, on the other hand—”

  “What tricks? The showers?”

  “No. That was Hoess’s. The camp commandant at Auschwitz. A matter of individual initiative, and quite effective as it turned out. Mine were of a subtler nature, actually. You know of my love for music. How it is playing constantly upstairs. Well, I know firsthand the calming effect of music. The normalizing effect it can have on the most bizarre of situations. Thus, I had every transport to Auschwitz greeted by the camp orchestra. They played Viennese waltzes as their fellow Jews detrained and were separated for the main camp or for Birkenau. This arrival was normally a most chaotic time. But once the orchestra was initiated, the new arrivals were calmed and lulled by it. A small innovation, yet it made everyone’s life so much easier.”

  “Marvelous.”

  “You asked. You needn’t be sarcastic when I respond to your requests. It seems obvious perhaps now, but then …”

  “What else?”

  “I don’t like to boast.”

  “Please do.”

  “That ploy took care of the new arrivals. But we also had to think of those Jews awaiting transport to the east. We needed to calm their fears and apprehensions, and we could hardly send an orchestra to every ghetto and shtetl in Europe. But the post, that was a different matter. We simply had each new inmate fill out a postcard for friends or relatives where they had come from, saying their new homes in the east were fine, and that there was nothing to worry about.”

  “Let me guess. The date was left open. Just like mine from Mexico City.”

  “—”

  “Just like mine, Herr ___?”

  “That was different.”

  “How?”

  “We have a bargain. It was done in good faith on both sides. You must believe that.”

  I feel badly about that slip. It puts Miss O’Brien on guard quite needlessly, for all that chicanery is behind me. In fact, she would not have needed to know about it if she had not pried it out of me herself. It was quite frankly not something I was going to include in this record. I scored high points for innovation at the time. One must remember what the years 1941–42 were like. The second front was opening in the East: a global war now and all the consequent transport problems that it wrought. Troops, materiel, supplies. The trains were rolling to and fro with our boys all over Europe and the Balkans. And in the midst of this, the Führer ordered that the solution of the Jewish problem be put into effect. As I say, I was not aware of the total meaning of that solution at the time. I had not been a participant at the Wannsee Conference, where so much of the policy was hammered out, though, ironically, it took place in a villa just around the corner from where my wife and I once lived. All I knew was the problem that adding the Jews of Europe to the transport lists would create. Anything I could do to lessen that problem was obviously my duty. Under the historical lamp, of course, my gambits appear cynical betrayals, less than human. But such is the chimerical nature of history. Had we Germans won the war, I would have had streets named after me. As it is, I am fearful to even use my own name.

  But I do not want Miss O’Brien to feel about me as the Wiesenthals and the soft liberals of the world do. A foolish desire, perhaps, an old man’s whim. It hurts that she feels deceived by me. Tonight, I will show her how much I trust her: We will have a candlelight dinner together upstairs. A sort of prelude to the outing she keeps demanding. I must also find some time to read the new story she exchanged with me. But not this afternoon. Too many things to do in preparation for the dinner, for it is Christmas Eve, a fact that I am sure has slipped her mind. Not mine, however. I never forget Christmas. It is my favorite of all the yearly festivals: the winter solstice, the birth of Christ, the rebirth of the sun. She will be surprised. I have decorated upstai
rs like something out of Dickens: streamers bedecking the rafters and a wizened fir tree in a corner adorned with red bows and white candles. Cordoba fetches me one from the high mountain pass in the center of the country each year—for an exorbitant price, I might add. But worth it to me. I have champagne on ice and a rum punch brewing. Fish instead of goose, but there is one’s health to consider. I would lay snow on, too, if humanly possible, but I am afraid that is out of my control. All in all, the place is quite festive looking. I do hope Miss O’Brien assumes the proper mood for the evening. No gifts, of course, for I am afraid that would only embarrass her, as she has not had the chance to purchase or make one for me. I am all aflutter just like Scrooge’s Mr. Fezziwig. Oh, I do so love Christmas. …

  “That was lovely, Herr ____.”

  “I’m glad you liked it. White fish is one of my favorites, as well.”

  “It’s another world up here. I’d forgotten. It seems so, so big. I needed this. Merry Christmas.”

  “We’ll leave the dishes until tomorrow.”

  “I don’t have to go down just yet?”

  “No, no. Just clearing away the clutter. A brandy?”

  “Umm.”

  “I take that as an assent?”

  “Yes. A double assent, please.”

  “You’re in a very festive mood, Miss O’Brien.”

  “Champagne does that for a girl. It’s been a long time since I’ve even bothered putting on a skirt, let alone doing my hair.”

  “You look quite lovely.”

  “I’m sure you say that to all your girls.”

  “—”

  “This is so unreal. I mean, here I am, here we are, exchanging coy small talk when I should be looking for a heavy candlestick to knock you over the head with.”

  “Why unreal? To my mind the realities are very apparent. We are behaving quite well under the circumstances.”

  “But I don’t want to behave well. That’s what happened to the Jews. Good manners and false hopes destroyed them. Why do I sit here sipping your brandy as if I’m at some quiet bistro in the Village? What’s happened to my rage?”

  “You’ll forgive me for saying so, Miss O’Brien, but it’s part of the syndrome I described. One begins to exchange realities.”

  “You talk as if reality were something you could slip on and off like a balaclava. I don’t think it’s that simple. Take you, for example.”

  “I’d rather not. Not on Christmas Eve, thank you.”

  “Your assumed persona of so many decades. It still doesn’t work for you, does it? At heart you’re a central European, not an aging soldier of fortune in the Central American forests.”

  “I admit I would rather be back in Austria, especially tonight. Rather we had won the war, for that matter, and that I were collecting an honorable pension as a retired warrior for my country. What is so revealing about that? What has that to do with the slip and tumble of changing realities?”

  “Come off it. What’s so honorable about being a warrior? You talk about it as if it were a profession set on Earth to save humanity rather than destroy it. Is that something to get passionate over? Destruction?”

  “Another brandy?”

  “Please. Well?”

  “You really do insist on jousting tonight?”

  “Yes.”

  “All right. Remember that first night, Miss O’Brien. You were looking at my statues on the mantel?”

  “Yes, and I couldn’t disagree more with your interpretation of the stone Venus.”

  “Your prerogative. But I’m thinking of the jaguar now. You know what that symbolizes?”

  “Probably something to do with war.”

  “Very good, Miss O’Brien. In point of fact, it was the symbol of the Maya warrior elite. Their palace guard. We live in a world of symbols, Miss O’Brien. Symbols to communicate, to motivate. The runic slashes of lightning we wore on our black Staffel uniforms are only part of a long tradition of warrior elites. We are related to the jaguar just as we are to the Spartan youths who fought battles without any quarter given or desired. There in a nutshell, or rather in the form of that onyx jaguar, is my passion. My reason. The warrior is one of the oldest of professions.”

  “And we all know what the oldest is.”

  “One of the most noble, as well.”

  “Bullshit. You talk as if you and your comrades symbolically fought at Thermopylae. It would be closer to the truth that your great forebears were scribes in Egypt, recording how many slaves died per day building the Great Pyramid. By your own admission you’re just a salesman and transporter. Where’s the nobility in that? Where’s the passion?”

  “—”

  “How about another brandy? Lovely stuff. Where was I? Yes, passion. That’s the ticket. Where’s the passion in your life at all? The only bit I see of it is Frau Wotruba, whom you abandoned.”

  “And what of you, Miss O’Brien? You talk grandly enough about it, but have you ever had what they call a grand passion? You seem to be quite alone in the world now.”

  “Oh, yes, I have. When I was seventeen. It was real love, and it hurt like the very devil. But you’re changing the subject. Just a drop more, thank you very much. I had a point to make. Wear my hat right and it won’t show. Christ, I do believe I’m getting tipsy.”

  “We could continue this tomorrow, if you wish.”

  “You haven’t slipped me a Mickey Finn, I presume? Which would be rather poor alliterative taste, to be sure. Slip a Mick a Mickey.”

  “I assure you, Miss O’Brien—”

  “Do please stop calling me Miss O’Brien. It makes me feel like a schoolmarm.”

  “—”

  “Deep down you’re just like all the rest. Want to get into a lass’s knickers at all costs. Get her oiled, have your way. Sign of masculinity and all that. Even when everything else is failing, that must function. The dynamo. Funny image. I conjure that up from you fellows. Old Nazis together. I hear Churchill’s pronunciation: Nahzzee. All you boys in black uniforms. Comparing girth and entrance requirements. Why wasn’t that on your SS chart? Sorry. I do get a bit vulgar after I’ve knocked a few back. We really should continue this tomorrow. By Jesus, it’s almost one o’clock. It’s Christmas Day! I asked him out once, you know. This grand love of mine when I was seventeen. Wasn’t going to sit around waiting for it to happen to me. Take life by the lapels. That sort of thing. Much too advanced for my age, even then. He accepted, he did. And I spent the rest of the night fending off digital advances under my knickers. Ruined it completely with my invitation. To the flickers, not my knickers. But he didn’t know. He was just a big dumb tit-puller whose dad owned the local dairy. God, what rosy cheeks he had. Christ, I’m tired.”

  “—”

  “You sit watching me like a cat. A fat tomcat waiting for the bird to fall asleep. Fall off her perch. Feathers in your mouth, puffing in the window-drawn breeze. Yellow feathers drifting like sea horses in the ocean …”

  “You’re drunk.”

  “Tipsy. A woman also glistens, never sweats. Any gentleman could tell you that.”

  “You can find the way to your room?”

  “Which means you’re disgusted with me. You won’t join me. Just this once?”

  “Good night, then. Any longer and I fear we will overstep the magic line.”

  “Wouldn’t want that. Damned fine drink you pour, though. That’s what I can’t figure.”

  “—”

  “What I can’t figure is how a person so dry as toast as you could have such fine old brandy. Now there’s a passion worth having, the drink. Or at the very least knowledge about the passion. God, how sad, Lancelot. I just discovered your secret. You do know about it, don’t you? All about it. The passion and the hunger and those things that make you feel good in the night. But there’s not a thing you can do to actually feel it,
is there? I mean, you’re cut off from it somehow. All you men were then. Cut off and out. Such a pity. A waste. To know about it and not be able to experience it. That’s why you collect people, prisoners. So you can watch life; experience by watching.”

  “Is there anything more, then?”

  “Too close to home? I have found it, haven’t I? You’re all empty, aren’t you? Empty and hungry, but never to be fed. Never to be sated. God, how sad.”

  “Until the morning, then.”

  “So, so sad.”

  On Sundays, Mother and Father would walk together in the park. Lying in my bedroom alcove I would hear them up early, bustling about the flat, dressing, making coffee, warming yesterday’s Semmeln in the oven, for the bakeries were closed on Sundays. Birdsong came from the open window; a bright light illuminated the paisley patterns on the curtain across my alcove. Spring. But I longed for winter. I turned the snow bubble on the bedside table upside down, then righted it. A white flurry descended upon the miniaturized Stephansdom inside. Mother called, but I pretended to be asleep. Finally, Mother tapped on the wall next to my bed; she would not draw aside the curtain without first knocking.

  “Sleepyhead. Breakfast is on.”

  I told her I was not feeling well.

  She entered the alcove, put her cool hand smelling of lavender water and rolls over my forehead, looked into my eyes.

  “Maybe you’d better stay in bed today, huh?”

  I nodded.

  “Some rest. Some reading. You’ll feel better by tonight?”

  Another nod. We never talked about it. We were secret conspirators in my battle with Father. He didn’t believe in privacy, in curtains across alcoves, in letting young boys spend all their free time reading novels. Healthy young men, to his mind, were out of doors walking in the woods or playing soccer with other healthy young boys. Fourteen-year-old boys who, like me, enjoyed books, being alone and privacy—well, such boys were suspect to Father. One never knows what tricks one might get up to behind closed curtains.

  “Pot roast tonight,” Mother reminded. “Your father will want you at the table.”