Chapter 6: Uranverein
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“Sarah, wake up. We have to get going.”
“What? It’s still dark.” Sarah wiped her eyes groggily. They’d been at Westerbork for only a day and already they were moving again. “But our things haven’t arrived yet.”
“What are you talking about? What things?” Esther was impatient and anxious. The German soldiers had taken to whipping the last person out the door. It was never good to be last.
“The soldiers at the train.” Sarah was suddenly indignant. “They said that our things from home would be sent to us later.”
Esther shook her head. “Oh, Sarah. I don’t know. Maybe our stuff was already sent to the new camp in Germany. Maybe it will all be waiting for us when we get there. Now hurry up. Don’t forget your bundle, and your shoe.” Esther knew nothing good was waiting for them in Germany. Their meager possessions would not be at the next camp, or the next one after that. It was just a lie to get them out of their homes without a riot. The only thing they owned now was the clothes on their backs. And Sarah was still missing a shoe. Esther would have given her one of her own, but Sarah’s feet were too big. So she hobbled around with one shoe on her right foot and an old piece of cloth wrapped around her left. And then at night she would count her blisters and complain about the cold. But at least they had a roof over their heads and a cot to sleep on. All that was about to change.
Esther managed to drag Sarah out of the drafty barracks just in time to avoid the soldiers’ whips. They stood in line silently, doing their best to avoid contact as they were inspected by the white-coated German doctors. Esther didn’t know exactly what they were looking for, perhaps strong workers or signs of disease. She couldn’t tell. Nor did she know whether it was better to be singled out or to remain with the group. All she knew was that she had to stay with her sister no matter what the cost.
“Open your mouth,” the doctor said in German. Esther complied obediently. And then the doctor looked at her, not as a patient, but as a person. He looked right in her eyes almost as if he knew who she was. “Young lady,” he said almost kindly, “who is your father? What did he do?”
At first Esther didn’t understand the question. Her father was a Jew. He didn’t do anything, or at least, not anything to deserve this punishment. But surely the doctor knew that. And then she understood what he meant.
“Eli Jacobs. He was an engineer. He designed machine parts.”
“And you, what did you do?” He smiled again.
“I helped him sometimes. I’m a student at the University of Amsterdam.”
“Ah.” He walked away after that. Esther could see him out of the corner of her eye talking with some of the soldiers. After a minute, a soldier came up to her and grabbed her arm.
“Come with me,” he said.
“No, not without my sister,” Esther pleaded but the soldier just squeezed tighter. He was a big man, fat like a bull, and frightfully strong. Esther felt as if her arm would break, but she pulled against him. “My sister comes with me.” She dropped her bundle and grabbed her sister’s hand. Sarah was crying.
“Come on, you filthy Jew.” The soldier yanked hard and the three of them fell into the mud. Some of the Germans laughed. The soldier stood up quickly with his whip in his hand. He was furious.
“Herr doctor,” Esther called out desperately. “My sister is a student too. She worked with my father. She’s very smart. She has to come with me.” Esther had no idea what she was saying, or if the doctor even cared. The soldier looked back at the doctor, perhaps a little surprised that a Jew would even dare to speak to him. The doctor looked up from his clipboard for a moment and then nodded to the soldier as if it really didn’t matter after all. The soldier looked back at Esther with obvious disappointment.
“Come on then. Bring your sister. But don’t think you’ve escaped me.” He put his whip back in his pocket. “I never forget.”
Esther and Sarah joined a smaller group of prisoners and walked for most of the day, through marshes and over rugged dirt roads, stopping only once at noon for a meager meal of stale buns and water. The guards herded them like animals. Esther tried to keep her sister in the center of the pack to spare her from the sting of the whip, but the rocks and nettles ripped through the rag on her shoeless foot causing her to bleed and suffer terribly. She cried out and the guards whipped her mercilessly. Esther dragged her along, ignoring her cries.
When they finally arrived at the next camp, they were led to a small barracks and told to wait inside. They weren’t alone. The windowless shack was already crammed with people, from wall to rotting wall. Nobody spoke, at first. Everyone was too scared. Had they been singled out because of their education or for some other reason? Would they be put to work at some clerical task until the end of the war, or made to endure some greater suffering? Were they damned or saved? No one knew, so no one dared speak.
After about an hour, the big bull opened the door. “There has been a change of plans for you,” he said with a humorless smile. “You will not be going to Bergen-Belsen with the others. Instead, you will be going to Dora-Mittelbau. Bergen-Belsen is a nice place, like a little farm, and only about seventy miles from here. Dora is at least double that, and high up in the Harz Mountains. Oh, yes, and there is no train, at least not for you. You will walk there.”
Walk to Germany? Esther looked immediately down at Sarah’s bleeding, shoeless foot. She would never make it. She wasn’t strong enough. Esther had condemned her own sister to an early grave.
The guard smiled evilly, his eyes falling on Esther and Sarah. And then he turned sharply and left, slamming the wooden door shut behind him. The door would be locked, as it always was, and once again they were left to suffer the night without food. Esther turned to her sister. “We have to find you a shoe,” she said hopefully, but Sarah was too tired to answer. There were no more cots, so she’d curled up on the floor in the corner. In moments she would be asleep. Esther didn’t have the heart to rouse her. For now, sleep was her only solace. She would have to find Sarah a shoe on her own.
A single oil lamp was burning by the door, but its light barely reached past the first few cots. If only she could find someone she knew—a neighbor, a friend from school. How could she ask a stranger for something as silly as a shoe? What would they think of her? There was a time when her sister’s closet boasted ten shoes. And now she only had one. Oh foolish child, how could you lose your own shoe?
Esther made her way slowly between the bodies. There must have been a hundred people crowded into the makeshift shack, and only enough cots for twenty. No one complained. They were too tired, but not too tired to cry. Esther heard whimpers and sobs, especially from the old and very young. She was ashamed to look in their faces, but she had to. She needed to find a familiar face, or at the very least, a sympathetic one.
An older woman caught her eye. Esther did not know her, but something about her eyes and gentle spirit seemed to welcome her. She reminded Esther of her grandmother so long ago.
“Excuse me,” Esther whispered not wanting to wake the others around her.
“What is it child?”
“Do you have a shoe?”
“A shoe?” the old woman asked oddly.
“Yes.” Esther felt foolish, but she soldiered on. “Do you have an extra shoe? My sister lost hers on the train and her foot is bleeding.”
The old woman made a sympathetic clucking noise with her tongue and shook her head sadly. “No, I’m sorry, child. I don’t. All I have are these old boots on my feet, and it looks like I’m going to need them, I’m afraid.” She pointed to the faded leather boots hanging off the edge of her cot. Esther had never owned such a shabby pair in all her life, but she would have given anything for them at that moment. Esther nodded and walked away.
She was discouraged, but now that she had broken the ice,
she felt emboldened. She ventured down the length of the barracks, stopping every few feet to query boldly into the darkness.
“Excuse me, ma’am. Do you have a shoe?”
“Please, ma’am, do you have an extra shoe?”
She was sure that someone would have one tucked away in their pockets or hidden under their clothes. But if someone did have an extra shoe, they would not share it with Esther. She became desperate. She started shaking people awake, searching their tired, frightened faces and pleading her case, and then people became impatient with her. They told her to be quiet and go to sleep. Some even threatened to strike her if she did not shut up. Her eyes filled with tears, but no one had any sympathy left for her. They had reached the end of human kindness, at least for today. She returned down the aisle and saw the old woman who had first spoken kindly. She was sleeping soundly, her ragged boots hanging limply off the end of her cot.
And then Esther had a terrible thought, and she acted on it.
The next morning, Esther awoke early, even before the guards came to rouse them with angry words and swift fists. “Come on, Sarah. Get up.” She nudged her sister who groaned loudly. “Come on. Get up.” She pushed her again and Sarah opened her eyes.
“What is it?”
“Put this on. I think it will fit.” She handed her the woman’s old leather boot and Sarah took it with some reluctance.
“It stinks. Where did you get it?”
“Just put it on. We have to go.”
Sarah removed the blood-soaked rag from her foot with a few squeals of pain. The cuts had stopped bleeding, at least. That much they could be thankful for. Sarah began picking at the scabs.
“Just put it on.”
“But—”
Esther grabbed the boot and began forcing it onto Sarah’s foot. Sarah squealed again, but the boot slipped on without too much trouble.
“Why did you do that?” Sarah complained, but Esther ignored her. Just then the fat guard threw open the door.
“Get up, you lazy Jews,” he announced. “There is only one meal today. If you do not get up, you do not eat.”
Esther bounded to her feet, dragging Sarah along with her.
“No, Esther. Stop.”
“Come on, Sarah. We have to go.” She tugged on Sarah’s arm and was almost at the door when she heard the old woman scream.
“My boot! Someone has stolen my boot!”
Esther dragged Sarah out the door and towards the feeding trough. Lately, the guards had taken to feeding their prisoners in this barbaric way. They would fill a trough with mush of some sort, usually scraps of bones and leftover vegetables boiled in a cooking pot, and force the prisoners to eat from it without any dishes or utensils of any kind. It was base and degrading but the only alternative was to starve. When the feeding trough was filled, the hungry women would queue up hurriedly and wait for their turn to feed like pigs. Esther hoped to hide Sarah in the line up, but things did not go so easy. The old woman had already caught sight of her old leather boot on Sarah’s foot, and she was hobbling after it.
“That’s my boot,” she scolded. “She stole me boot.”
“Get back in line,” the big bull of a guard snapped reflexively, but the old woman did not hear him. She heard nothing but the sound of her own indignant cries. She saw nothing, not the guard, not the whip in his hand, nothing save the old leather boot on Sarah’s foot. She pointed an accusing finger and marched adamantly forward.
“She stole my—” And that was when the guard hit her, square on in the mouth with his huge fist. She fell backwards but not down. Blood dripped down her chin. Now she saw the guard, but for some reason, she did not fear him. She had lost everything—her house, her family, her dignity, and as silly as it sounded, she would not lose her boot. She straightened up as if challenging him to strike her again and said very clearly. “But it’s my boot.”
The guard looked momentarily stunned. He could not have been afraid of her. She was just an old woman who wanted her boot. He must have outweighed her by a hundred pounds. He could have beaten her senseless. But he didn’t. Instead, he pulled out his gun and shot her in the head. She fell backwards and landed directly in the feeding trough with a splash.
There was a collective gasp of horror and then the women fell silent. The bull guard seemed to delight in the moment. He approached her twitching corpse and dragged it roughly out of the trough with one hand. And then, for the first time, he noticed that she was missing a boot. He turned back to Sarah, saw the other boot on her foot and laughed loudly.
“Would you like a matching set?” he asked. Sarah shook her head slowly. “Like I’ve always said. Animals.” The guard turned his attention back to the crowd of women. “You have five minutes to eat. Get back in line.” He holstered his pistol and went away still laughing to himself.
At first, the women were hesitant to approach the trough with the old woman’s corpse still beside it, but then the hunger overcame them and they ate. What would her father and grandfather think of her if they saw this? What if Henrik saw her? Would he still want to marry her? Even if he did somehow find her, and she miraculously survived this war, would she still be human?
Esther thought she saw blood mixed in with the gruel. Her stomach groaned with hunger. She closed her eyes and reached into the trough.