Obsessed Page 8

  The baby? Tears sprang to her eyes. Dear God, what was she thinking? No! She could never hate the life that grew within her body. Never!

  10

  Torun

  April 26, 1944

  End of Workday

  THE NEXT DAY CREPT BY, TORMENTED BY THE BURDEN OF THE unknown. Golda had made the report to one of the guards before the eight o’clock work bell. Ruth and Martha were assigned to the fat vats, a hot, grueling place that would have sweated the women dead in a single day if not for the extra rations of water.

  The bell signaling the end of the workday customarily rang at six. At five, when one of the guards signaled for her and Ruth to follow him, Martha rose from her stool with terrible anxiousness.

  The guard marched them to the red house on the hill.

  The air felt cool, promised rain. Birds chirped, full of life, a far cry from the deathlike hissing of the fat vats. Martha glanced over her shoulder at the camp below. From this vantage point, it looked crisp and clean, except for the huge mud hole in the center yard. It could easily be a Hungarian factory or a large college for boys.

  A prisoner tended a flower bed that lined the walkway to the porch. Her eyes caught Martha’s for the briefest of moments and then turned away. Did she know something? No, how could she? Except perhaps that few prisoners who entered the house fared well.

  Martha swallowed and climbed the steps, legs weak and shaking.

  Be strong. Don’t slouch. He likes pretty women.

  Both she and Ruth were pretty. Maybe that would give them favor. A petite doll from Slovakia and a tall brunette from Hungary. The thought sickened her.

  Ruth took her hand and squeezed. She could feel a slight tremble in the fingers of the younger woman, who was brave not because she didn’t feel fear, but because she faced it with surprising strength. Little Ruth needed her, didn’t she? It was why she’d found Martha on the train. It was why she had taken Martha’s hand now.

  Martha squeezed back. “Be brave,” she whispered. “He will never send away two such beautiful women. We are in God’s hands, remember?” She didn’t know which hope would prove true, that they’d find themselves in God’s hands or that the commandant would find something in them to favor. Maybe both, maybe neither.

  The guard opened the door and pushed them in. A young boy standing behind a chair, perhaps Braun’s twelve-year-old son, stared at them for a moment and then ran down the hall.

  The door shut behind them. They faced a spacious living room, handsomely decorated with crystal and paintings and golden velvet drapes, not unlike her father’s country home outside Budapest. Leather couches surrounded a large, turquoise Oriental rug, well-worn but tightly woven. A long dining table was set with silver goblets and tall red candles.

  Without warning, Braun stepped into the room from the kitchen. He’d been waiting there, staring at them with his dead, blue eyes.

  It occurred to Martha that her hand was still in Ruth’s. She tried to pull it free, but Ruth clung too tightly. The commandant wore his uniform slacks and knee-high black leather boots, but above his waist, only a white undershirt. His eyebrows arched.

  His eyes drifted over them. “The two pretty ones.” He walked to a cabinet and withdrew a bottle of red wine. “Would you like to join me in a drink?”

  Martha heard the question, but she felt as though she were trying to breathe through syrup. Her heart sounded too loud in her ears. Her hand was still in Ruth’s tight grip. They should decline, right?

  “That would be nice,” Ruth said evenly, finally releasing Martha’s hand. “Thank you.”

  “Wonderful. It’s not exactly German wine, but it is quite fine.” Braun pulled out the cork and sniffed the bottle. “When in Poland, do as the Polish.” He grinned, poured three shallow glasses, and stepped forward with two.

  Ruth and Martha each took a glass.

  “Thank you.”

  “Thank you.” Martha thought her voice sounded like a mouse, and she determined to be stronger.

  Braun retrieved his own glass. “So I understand that these two feisty Jews are pregnant. Honestly, I never would have guessed. You’re both so”— he turned—“fresh looking.”

  Ruth lowered her eyes. “Thank you, sir.”

  Thank you? Was Ruth going too far?

  Braun regarded Ruth with a pleasantly surprised look. Maybe her friend was onto something. What if the commandant chose to let her live, but sent Martha away?

  “You’re too flattering,” Martha said, lowering her eyes as Ruth had done.

  “Hmm. Yes, I suppose I can be. But you should know that I detest the fat guts of pregnant women. Especially bloated Jewess guts. If I know that the pure Aryan race is to be extended by a birth, I can stomach the sight. Otherwise I find myself wanting to vomit.”

  Martha stared into her glass. For a moment, he had seemed almost human. Now, she resisted a sudden urge to throw his wine at him and scratch out his eyes. Not even Ruth had a quick answer.

  Braun was watching them carefully. “Which is why, whenever I oversaw the execution of Jews before being sent here, I personally shot the pregnant women. Himmler insists that no more than two bullets be used for each Jew. When I shoot a pregnant whore, I can take out two Jews with one bullet. How does that strike you?”

  “It strikes me as inhuman,” Martha said evenly.

  Ruth glanced at her, then back at the SS officer. “It strikes me as diabolical. Only a coward would even find such a thing admirable.”

  Braun’s grin seemed to stick in one place. They’d surely committed themselves to death.

  He suddenly grinned wide and set down the glass. “Fortunately for you, neither of you has a pig gut. Lift your shirts, please.”

  Martha hesitated only a fraction of a second before lifting her shirt to reveal her belly. Ruth did the same.

  “Amazing. You can hardly see it. They tell me six months.”

  “Yes.”

  “I like children, of course. I love children, actually. Even, dare I say it, the odd Jewish child. Young, impressionable minds waiting to be formed. Innocence. Innocence can be intoxicating. That’s why we sometimes kill a hundred Jews at once, you know. So that when we kill only twenty, we are practicing a kind of innocence.”

  “I can see the logic,” Ruth said. “But wouldn’t killing no Jews lend itself to an even purer innocence?”

  Braun stared at her, as if considering the argument for the first time. “But then we are confronted with another evil,” he said.

  “Allowing Jews to live?”

  “Precisely.” He held her gaze. “Sometimes the death of one satisfies the wrath of a just God. Isn’t that why God demanded blood sacrifice from the Jews?”

  “The death of a lamb,” Ruth said. “Not a human. A long time ago.”

  “The last sacrifice of the Jews wasn’t a lamb. It was a man. Jesus Christ. You don’t remember?”

  “You use the indiscretion of a few men to justify a slaughter?”

  He stared at her and then abruptly diverted his gaze. “You will both live. You will be given double rations and allowed to give birth, should you survive so long. In exchange for this, I ask only that you visit me on occasion. You don’t need to be afraid; I won’t touch you, although I do find you both very beautiful. I would just like your company from time to time.”

  Ruth dipped her head without removing her eyes from his. “Thank you, sir. You can be very kind.”

  “Well, I suppose we all have it in us.” He walked to the wall and plucked a red scarf from a hook and handed it to Ruth. “I would like you to do me a favor. Take this scarf into your barracks and place it on the bed five down from your own. The woman will know what it means.”

  Ruth took the scarf. “Just place it on the bed?”

  “Yes. Just drape it over the bed. Will you?”

  “Of course.”

  Braun smiled. “Good. Good, then. You may leave.”

  Ruth folded the scarf and tucked it under her waistband.

/>   Martha wasn’t sure how to feel about their good fortune.

  The barracks were still empty when they arrived. Together they ran to the window and watched the guard walk away. Ruth was clearly more elated than Martha. She lit up like a Christmas bulb and threw her arms around her friend.

  “See what Golda says to that!” Ruth said. “You see what passion can do?”

  “It’s not over, Ruth. It’s a beginning, but—oh, you’re right! Thank you!” She kissed Ruth on the cheek. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”

  Ruth pulled out the scarf and walked to the bunk five down from hers—Rebecca’s, if Martha remembered right—and unfolded it over the corner of the bed.

  “Come, let me show you something,” Martha said. She led Ruth to her bunk and slid onto the bed, where she’d scratched ninety small marks into the wall. “This is how we will know when the baby is due. Each day, I will cross one off.”

  “I can hardly believe he’s agreed.”

  A morsel of doubt tempted Martha. Golda had insisted that the commandant only lifted hope to crush it. She pushed the thought aside.

  “The end of July.”

  The door suddenly creaked open. Women began filing in, worn to the bone. Ruth and Martha exchanged a glance and then bounded out of the bed.

  “Where’s Golda?”

  Golda was the eighth person to step through the door. The first seven had stopped and were staring. They knew? Golda had frozen in the doorway. They knew already? They all knew?

  But Golda wasn’t staring at her, was she? Not at all. Her eyes were fixed past Martha’s shoulder, down the aisle. They were all staring down the aisle.

  She turned with Ruth, but there was nothing to see. Only the red scarf.

  Martha faced Golda. “What?” The woman’s face had drained of blood. “What is it?”

  “The scarf,” Golda said matter-of-factly. “It’s on Rebecca’s bed.”

  “The commandant told me to put it there,” Ruth said. “Is—what does it mean?”

  Golda walked past them, picked up the scarf, stared at it for a second, and then set it back on the bed. Two dozen women now crowded the aisle by the door, all eyes fixed on the red scarf. A few lowered their heads and walked off.

  “What is it?” Ruth cried.

  “It’s Braun’s game,” Golda said softly. “Every few days, he orders a guard to place the scarf on a bed. The selected woman is required to visit the commandant at six thirty for dinner.”

  “For dinner? Oh, my dear, poor Rebecca. I had no idea! I didn’t—”

  “The woman does not return. The next morning she is found dead, hanging by her neck from the front gate.” Martha felt the blood drain from her face.

  Ruth lunged for the scarf, but Golda stopped her short. “You can’t do anything! Stop it!”

  A loud gasp silenced the group. There in the doorway stood Rebecca, eyes fixed wide on the red scarf. She slowly lifted a trembling hand to her mouth. Her face went white like paste. Nobody moved.

  Then three women converged on her. They placed their arms around her neck and began stroking her hair in a kind of silent ritual that struck terror in Martha’s heart. No one made a sound.

  Except Rebecca. Rebecca suddenly sagged and began to whimper.

  “YOU’RE TWELVE—grow up! This isn’t a world made from fairy tales. It’s a world where lions eat sheep and powerful men eat inferior animals like Jews.”

  Roth watched his father, terrified and in awe at the same time. He lowered his eyes to his knees, bared between his shorts and knee socks. No matter what Father said, thinking of other boys his age as animals was still a little strange, although he wouldn’t dare admit such a thing.

  This was his third visit to the camp, and each time the sights became easier to accept, but he doubted very much that young boys were meant to see the things he saw. His friends back in Berlin walked around all proud in their uniforms, but they hadn’t seen what he’d seen.

  “Come here,” his father said in a softer tone, stepping toward the window. He stretched out his arm and beckoned with his fingers. “Come on, I want to show you something.”

  Roth approached and looked out at the work camp below them. It was brown everywhere. Mud and dirty buildings and women plodding around in brown clothes. Some of them wore white scarves on their heads.

  Father placed a calloused hand on Roth’s shoulder. “What do you see?”

  Roth thought about it. “Jews?”

  “Yes, that’s what most would say. Jews. But when I look I see more than Jews. What I see separates me from most men.”

  Roth looked up. There was something almost magical about the way his father looked at him with those mesmerizing blue eyes.

  “What do you see?” Roth asked.

  Father lifted his eyes. “What I see isn’t for children.”

  Roth felt a stab of disappointment. The feeling quickly changed to humiliation.

  “But I’m not a child,” he said. “How can I grow up if you don’t let me see things that other children don’t see?”

  His father considered this.

  “Once you cross the threshold, there’s no turning back. Are you sure you’re ready for that?”

  He wasn’t sure. Not at all. But he nodded anyway. “Yes.”

  Father stepped back and arched one eyebrow. His eyes dropped to Roth’s feet then up his body. Roth stood tall, uncomfortably aware that he was quite short for such a bold statement.

  But judging by the look on his father’s face, Gerhard was proud of his answer. He’d stood there like a man and said yes.

  The commandant stepped forward and smoothed Roth’s blond hair. “You come from good stock, boy.” He paced in front of the window, one hand stroking his chin. “Do you remember what I told you about the swastika?” he asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Tell me.”

  “That it is an old symbol that has been changed.”

  “The Sanskrit word, svastika, means good fortune. It’s a spiral spinning with the sun. Only those who have a clear understanding of the occult know that a chaotic force can be evoked by reversing the symbol. This is behind the design of our swastika.”

  His father stopped and turned to him. “This war—all that the Third Reich is doing,” he stretched his hand out to the camp below, “in camps like these—is about power. It’s about reversing the effect of a terrible degeneration that has ruined civilization over thousands of years. This is the führer’s primary objective. Do you understand?”

  His father had tensed and his hand shook a little. It made Roth nervous.

  “Do you understand?”

  “Yes, Father.”

  Father stared at the camp. “When I look at that mud hole down there, I don’t see Jews. I see degenerated humanity. I see a wrong that needs to be righted. And I see the perfect solution. In ridding the world of them, yes, but not in the same way I did at Auschwitz. They are killing enough Jews each day to satisfy our objective. Marching them into the chambers like zombies, ignorant of their fate.” The man’s lips twisted in disgust. “Here . . . here our task is far nobler. Here we are finding a way to power the new world.”

  Roth followed his stare. How Father saw a way to power the world with the sad-looking Jews below was beyond him, so he said nothing.

  “They are like batteries,” his father said.

  “Batteries?”

  “Psychic fuel cells. If you know how to take that power, it becomes yours and makes you strong. Like taking the power out of one battery and putting it in your own.”

  His father had closed his eyes. His lips trembled. Roth quickly lowered his eyes, afraid to be caught looking.

  “Do you know what hope and fear have in common?”

  Was he meant to answer? Roth wondered briefly if his father was speaking to him, or to himself.

  “They both hold great power. But that power is dependent on both fear and hope together. Think about it. Without the fear of something terrible, you cannot have the hope
that it won’t happen, you see? Without having hope for something wonderful, you can’t have any fear of losing it. They work together, the two most powerful forces we possess.”

  Father turned from the window, walked to the bar, and poured a drink into a glass. “I play a game of high stakes here, Roth. I play for the kind of power that few men will ever have. Not the power of deciding who will live and who will die—that’s child’s play. But the power of taking another human being’s power. The power to harvest their souls.”

  He paused, eyes glimmering, as if this was a great revelation that should impress Roth. And indeed it did. His heart was beating very fast.

  “I lift their hopes to the heavens”—he lifted his hand high in the air, then swung it down hard—“then dash them. Why? you may want to know. I’ll tell you why. The anguish they feel in that moment weakens their will. Their resolve turns to putty. Their anguish becomes my power.”

  Then his father said one more thing that would never leave Roth.

  “This is how the Prince of Darkness has always gained his power— through the suffering of his victims. That’s how he took the life of the Christian God, Jesus Christ. Raised him up and dashed him to the ground. And he was a Jew too.”

  Father chuckled, took a drink, then set the glass down with a satisfied sigh.

  “There are many of us, Roth, not just me. Our work is meticulously recorded, and one day I will show you what we have done. The deaths of our enemies—these Jews—is a happy bonus. But it is the power that feeds us. Does this excite you?”

  Only then did Roth realize that he was squeezing his hand into a fist. He relaxed, but he found that he couldn’t speak.

  Father smiled reassuringly. “Not to worry. It was all quite strange to me as well. I still remember the first ritual I witnessed. It scared me to death. But the power, Roth . . . the power was intoxicating!”

  He laughed and Roth joined, glad for the relief.

  “Would you like to join me tonight?” his father suddenly asked.

  “Join you?”

  “Well, not join me. You can watch me through the slit in the door. I’ve picked a woman. At this moment she’s down there in the camp, plumbing the deepest wells of her soul, dredging up horror. Tonight I will ravage her soul. Don’t worry, it won’t be gory or brutal. I have no need for theatrics. A little blood is all.”