Trudy is in the hallway, sorting through her keys to find the one that locks the door, when her phone rings.
She steps back into her office and stares at the blinking red light on the console. It’s probably just Ruth, Trudy tells herself, checking in to see if there has been any progress—or to boast, in the subtlest of fashions, about the number of Jewish subjects’ testimonies she has already recorded.
Professor Swenson, Trudy says into the phone.
Hello?
It is a woman’s voice. Not Ruth’s. Containing the quaver of the elderly.
Ja, und with whom am I speaking? Have I reached the Department of History?
Trudy’s pulse quickens and flutters in her throat. The woman’s accent is more Bavarian than Anna’s, but some similarities exist: the broadening of the vowels, the clipped consonants, the emphasis on the ff ’s in of. Department uff History.
Yes, ma’am, this is the History Department, Trudy says. Are you calling about the advertisement? The German Project?
There is a clunk, as if the caller has dropped the receiver, and some scuffling in the background. Trudy braces herself for the buzz of a severed connection, but then she hears the woman breathing.
What is your name, ma’am? Trudy asks. Are you still with me?
Kluge. Frau Kluge. First name Petra.
Trudy grabs a pen.
Danke, Frau Kluge, she says. Now, I assume you’re volunteering for—
You want to know about the war, the woman says.
Yes, that’s right.
Why is this?
Well, says Trudy, as I said in my ad, I’m doing some research—
What kind of research? You will not make me look bad?
You vill nutt mekk me look bett?
Of course not, says Trudy. I’m just trying to collect some stories—
Gut, the woman says. Because I can tell you a little something . . . But! You said volunteer?
What’s that? says Trudy.
Volunteer, you have said this. But your advertisement said I will be paid. How much, exactly?
Um, says Trudy, annoyed with herself; she has forgotten to ask Ruth the amount of the stipend she is offering her own subjects. Fif— A hundred dollars?
Gut. That is agreeable.
I’m glad, Trudy says. So, when would you—
I live at 1043 North Thirtieth Street, apartment B. You will come tomorrow.
Oh, says Trudy, scribbling madly. Well, thank you, Frau Kluge, but are you sure you want to do it so soon? We won’t have much time to prep—
Three o’clock, the woman says.
Okay then, says Trudy. Now, there are a few other things you should know, Frau Kluge: I’ll have a cameraman with me to record the interview, and—
But Frau Kluge has hung up.
Trudy removes the receiver from between shoulder and ear and regards it for a moment. Then she wedges it back into place and sifts through her German Project paperwork for the number of Ruth’s videographer. It seems too much to hope that he will be available this close to Christmas. But if he is not, Trudy is prepared to beg.
Her luck holds, at least until the following afternoon, when it seems to abruptly run out: the cameraman, while cheerfully acquiescent on the phone, is late. Trudy waits for him in her car on Frau Kluge’s street, feeling like a burglar. This would be nothing new in this neighborhood, she thinks; the residents here are probably on perpetual alert for thieves. Frau Kluge lives in a two-story brick building in a grid of five identical others, all surrounded by chain-link fencing into which garbage has blown. In the parking lot, a few old cars are nosed up to dirty drifts of snow. Somehow this surprises Trudy. She doesn’t know what she has expected, but it was certainly not to find her first subject in the projects.
She is trying to focus on the questions she has spent all night preparing when a white truck turns the corner, cruises slowly down the street, and parks at the curb a few yards away. A man in an army jacket jumps from the driver’s side and jogs around to the tailgate, which he yanks up with a rattle. Thank God, Trudy thinks. She grabs the bakery box of cookies she has bought for Frau Kluge and gets out of her car to greet him, her boots gritting on the sanded ice.
Hello in there, she calls, for the man has disappeared inside his truck, from which a ramp protrudes like a corrugated steel tongue. Are you my videographer?
The man pokes his head out, and Trudy sees that his eyes are so light as to be nearly colorless. Her stomach drops. She has always been uneasy around light-eyed men.
She reaches up to shake his proffered hand.
Trudy Swenson, she says.
Thomas Kroger, replies the man. Sorry to have kept you waiting, the damned tailgate was frozen shut . . . Just give me one more minute.
Again he vanishes from view, and a cart loaded with bulky equipment in padded blankets begins descending the ramp. The man follows, clinging to its handle. As more and more of him emerges, it becomes apparent that he is very tall, perhaps six-five. Once on solid ground, he smiles down at Trudy; he is about her age, a throwback to the hippie era. His face is so round that it is unlined except for the eyes, but he wears a red bandanna around his forehead beneath his shaggy graying hair.
Trudy imagines Anna’s disdain over the bandanna and wishes she could ask him to take it off. Instead, she looks doubtfully at the cart.
I didn’t expect you to bring all this, she says. This Project is a relatively modest operation—
Thomas laughs.
You did want this interview filmed, right? he says. I’m a professional, you know, Dr. Swenson, not a tourist. I don’t work with a handheld camcorder.
Oh, I guess not, says Trudy, though she is a bit startled by the protruding tripods and sound booms after all Ruth’s talk about operating on a shoestring budget. Forgive me; I didn’t mean to offend. And please, call me Trudy.
Thomas shuts the tailgate and secures it with a padlock.
No offense taken, he says. Okay, Trudy, I’m all set. Lead the way.
Trudy does, Thomas and his cart trailing her through the chain-link fence to the proper building. The outer door is heavy steel and covered with graffiti; next to it is a security panel. Trudy presses B and waits. Nothing happens. Thomas reaches past her and pushes the door open.
It’s broken, he says.
Trudy ventures into a hallway so dimly lit that she has to pause to let her eyes adjust. The building smells of mildew and urine and industrial-strength floor cleaner. Trudy approaches the nearest apartment, squinting to make out its number, and leaps away from the ferocious barking and snarling inside.
God in heaven, she says, putting a hand over her galloping heart.
Thomas chuckles again.
Somebody’s got a rottweiler, he says. But not the somebody we want, thank goodness. Over here, Trudy.
She follows his voice down a few steps to a basement apartment near a stairwell and knocks on the door. No response. Trudy tries again, more emphatically this time.
Ja, ja, calls a voice, somewhat peevishly, from within.
Trudy hears a chair being scraped back and the scuff of slippers, but the door doesn’t open. She gives Thomas a pained smile.
Sorry about all this, she says. I had no idea—
I’ve worked in worse places, Thomas says.
Well, I appreciate it. Especially that you were able to do this so close to Christmas.
Thomas shrugs, as best he is able. He is hunched in the triangulated space beneath the stairwell, his head bent so as not to bang it on the risers.
Christmas doesn’t mean much to me, he says. I’m Jewish.
Trudy cranes to discern his expression, but it is impossible in the hallway’s jaundiced gloom.
Ruth did tell you I’m interviewing Germans? she asks.
Of course, says Thomas. That’s why I’m here. I’m dying to hear how these people could possibly justify what they did.
Trudy’s queasiness increases. She should have known that Ruth’s videographer would be Jewish. But this
is the last thing Trudy needs, a cameraman who is not impartial. What if he disrupts the interview, interjects indignant questions or snorts in disbelief ?
She has no time to envision how to handle this, though, for she hears a series of bolts being drawn and then Frau Kluge opens the door. An inch, anyway.
What do you want, she says.
Vhat do you vant. Trudy steps to the side so Frau Kluge can see her, trying her best to produce an ingratiating smile.
Frau Kluge? she says. I’m Trudy Swenson—
I am not interested in anything you are peddling, the woman says.
No, no, I’m from the university. We spoke yesterday on the phone, remember? About the German Project. You agreed to let me interview you? About the war?
There is a pause, and then the woman says, Ach, ja. This slipped from my mind.
The door opens halfway.
Trudy squares her shoulders and steps into Frau Kluge’s studio, a little box of an apartment redolent of mothballs and tomato soup. The blinds are half-drawn, and beneath them through the window Trudy sees the fender of a car. Frau Kluge is lowering herself, with some difficulty, into a chair at a Formica table, the only place, with the exception of a second chair and a sagging daybed, where it is possible to sit.
You have a, um, a cozy home here, Trudy says.
Frau Kluge dismisses this with the wave of an arthritis-bunched hand.
It is a dump, she says.
Trudy looks somewhat desperately at Thomas, who is inspecting the room with narrow-eyed concentration.
Is it all right if I set up over here? he asks, indicating the daybed.
Ja, Frau Kluge says, shrugging.
Trudy refreshes her smile and sets the bakery box on the table.
What is this? Frau Kluge asks.
Cookies.
Frau Kluge picks at the striped string. Trudy reaches over to help, but Frau Kluge whisks the box away and gets up to fetch a knife from the sideboard. She slashes the lid open and peers inside.
Ach, Makronen, she says. My favorite.
She fishes out a macaroon and begins to eat, scattering crumbs on her cardigan. Trudy takes advantage of the conversational lull by sitting and consulting her notes, stealing glances at Frau Kluge all the while. She is approximately Anna’s age, Trudy guesses, in her late seventies, but the resemblance ends there. Frau Kluge is a small squat woman, her face pouched and creased, her eyes hidden behind large square drugstore glasses. Her hair is a mushroom cap of such uniform gray that it can only be a wig. One real hair, long and white, grows from her chin.
Frau Kluge roots through the box in search of more macaroons; then, having apparently consumed them all, she pushes it toward Trudy.
No, thanks, says Trudy. I’m glad you enjoyed them, though.
They were stale, Frau Kluge says.
Trudy inhales deeply and looks down at her portfolio.
Frau Kluge, I thought we might talk about the interview—
Where is the money?
Excuse me?
The hundred dollars. Where is it?
From her purse Trudy extracts a check embossed with the university logo and slides it across the table. Frau Kluge fumbles it up and holds it close to her eyes, then folds it and makes it vanish into a pocket.
Ja, she says. Gut.
She struggles to her feet to stow the bakery box string in a drawer. Then she removes something from the refrigerator door and scuffs back to the table with it.
My grandchildren, she says, holding it out.
Trudy takes it from her and looks obediently at two children encased in magnetized Lucite. From against the marbled suede backdrop favored by school photographers, they grin up at Trudy, the girl’s hair so tightly bound in ribboned barrettes that her eyes are pulled in a painful squint, the boy’s mouth brash with braces. They appear to Trudy deeply ordinary children. She turns the photograph over and through the yellowing plastic reads the inscription: Andi und Teddy, 1989. Seven years ago.
Trudy looks up at Frau Kluge with new interest.
Your grandson must be quite a young man by now, she says.
Frau Kluge mumbles and tugs at a loop of yarn on her sweater.
Trudy hesitates, then presses her advantage: Are you going to see them at Christmas? she asks.
Frau Kluge snatches the photograph.
Ja, of course I am, she snaps. Why should I not? Do you have grandchildren?
No, I—
Children?
No—
You have at least a husband?
I was married once, but—
Frau Kluge nods in satisfaction. He is dead, she says.
Trudy laughs.
No, he’s very much alive. Runs an extremely successful French restaurant, in fact. Le P’tit Lapin, maybe you’ve heard of it? It—I do not eat French food, Frau Kluge announces. Rich sauces rot the bowels.
She glares triumphantly at Trudy. A small silence occurs, during which Trudy hears water dripping and dripping in the woman’s sink.
Then Frau Kluge, perhaps mollified by her victory, thaws somewhat, for she tells Trudy, You remind me a little of my daughter. Of course, you are several years older. But you are something like her, through hier.
She pats the air near her cheeks. Trudy nods.
You are German? Frau Kluge asks.
Yes.
A true German? Not a Mischling?
Trudy makes a mental note of Frau Kluge’s use of the Nazi term for half-breed, but she is not about to spurn this peculiar olive branch the woman is offering. She decides to go a step further.
Nein, Trudy answers. Ich bin keine Mischling , Frau Kluge. Ich bin Deustche.
Frau Kluge scrutinizes Trudy from behind her glasses, which a beam of weak light has transformed into opaque white squares. Then she slowly lowers them and gives Trudy a smile of complicity.
So, she says. Sehr gut. I should have known you were pure of blood. From your pretty blond hair.
Trudy’s hand involuntarily rises to her bangs.
Excuse me, Thomas calls.
Trudy turns toward him with dread, anticipating what he might say, but his face is benign. Behind him the area around Frau Kluge’s daybed is now a movie set of sorts: light screens and big lamps, a camera mounted on a tripod, a sound boom the shape of an enormous peanut dangling in midair. Thomas holds up two microphones, their wires trailing into a tangle on the tired carpet.
Let’s get you ladies miked and bring those chairs over here, he says. Then we’ll be ready to begin.
19
THE GERMAN PROJECT
Interview 1
SUBJECT: Mrs. Petra Kluge (née Petra Rauschning) DATE/LOCATION: December 21, 1996; North Minneapolis, MN
Q: Let’s start with a few simple questions, Frau Kluge. When and where were you born?
A: I was born 14 August 1919, in Munich, Germany.
Q: Did you remain in Munich throughout your childhood?
A: Ja, I lived there until I came to this country.
Q: So you were in Munich at the beginning of the war, in September 1939?
A: Where else would I be?
Q: You were how old then—twenty? No, excuse me, twenty-one.
A: Ja, just turned.
Q: So you were a young woman when Hitler invaded Poland. What was your reaction to that?
A: [subject shrugs] Whatever the Führer wanted to do, this was fine by me.
Q: So you approved.
A: Approved, disapproved, it made no difference. Who was I to question such things?
Q: Were you frightened?
A: There was no cause for fear. Everybody knew the Poles were no match for us. And the Führer was recovering only what belonged to Germany. He was thinking of his people, of Lebensraum—
Q: Living space. He invaded Poland for more living space.
A: Ja, for Aryans, that is correct.
Q: So you agreed with the war in principle.
A: Ja, I already have said this. Natürlich, if I had known what wo
uld then happen, I might not have . . . But I was only young.
Q: What did you think of Hit—of the Führer’s other theories?
A: What do you mean by this?
Q: About the Jews. About making Germany, um, free of Jews.
A: Judenrein.
Q: That’s right.
A: I was too busy to pay attention to such things. It did not concern me.
Q: What was happening to the Jews did not concern you?
A: Ja, it held no meaning for me personally. I did not know any Jews.
Q: None?
A: Ja, well, perhaps in Gymnasium, there were . . . But they soon had to go to their own schools. They kept to themselves. You know how they do, in their temples and their . . . their what-have- you.
Q: But surely you must have encountered Jews in the course of your daily life. On public transportation, in cafés, on the street—
A: Nein, nein. Very little. Very little. At first perhaps I encountered some without knowing it. But when they had to wear the Star, nein, they were no longer in the parks and trains and such.
Q: And what did you think of this?
A: I thought nothing of it. As I have said, it had little to do with me. Perhaps it made some things easier—
Q: What things? In what way?
A: [shrugs] Ach, you know. Not so crowded. In the stores, more space, more food for us Germans, once they had to go to their own stores where they belonged.
Q: I see. Did you think this was fair?
A: Fair, unfair, it made things easier. You knew who belonged with who.
Q: It didn’t bother you that Jews were no longer allowed to buy things in Aryan stores, to visit Aryan doctors, to attend the theater—
A: Nein. And it did not bother them either. They like to stick to their own kind. And they did not suffer, believe me. They could still buy whatever they wanted.
Q: How is that?
A: They had their ways. They always had their ways.
Q: They had money, you mean?
A: Ja, ja, this is exactly right. Before the war, when Germans were starving, when we had to wait hours for a loaf of bread . . . when there was looting, windows being broken, people being killed for a few Pfennigs . . . they could just waltz in and buy whatever they pleased. Their pockets clinked with money. Their coats were lined with fur.
Q: And during the war?