. . . But you have left the father rabbit out entirely, the Ober-sturmführer is saying. And that will never do. What is his name?
Guess, says Trudie.
Ach, I am not smart enough. You’ll have to tell me.
No, guess, you have to guess, the child insists.
Peder.
No.
Dieter, says the Obersturmführer.
Trudie whips her head from side to side, braids flying.
The Obersturmführer throws out his hands.
I give up, he says. What is it?
Horst! Trudie shouts.
She giggles wildly as the Obersturmführer ’s chair thumps to the floor.
Horst? he says, feigning great astonishment.
Yes, yells Trudie; yes, yes, your name, what Mama calls you!
She squeals and squirms as the Obersturmführer plucks her from her chair and slings her over his shoulder in much the same way he carried the side of venison in earlier.
That’s very clever, he tells her, very clever indeed. And do you know what becomes of clever little girls who steal other people’s names?
No, what?
They must go straight to bed, says the Obersturmführer.
Noooooooooo, Trudie cries. Please, let me stay up just a few minutes longer, I’ll be good, please—
The Obersturmführer dumps her unceremoniously on her feet.
That’s enough. It’s late. You’ll go to sleep so fast you won’t know what happened.
He swats Trudie’s rump and turns.
Anna, he says.
Anna rises and takes Trudie by the hand.
Can I have a story? the girl begs.
You have already had one, Anna tells her. Come along now.
The Obersturmführer stretches mightily, canvassing the table, and releases a belch.
You may leave the dishes, he says to Anna, sotto voce, as she passes. I will be upstairs.
Anna lingers as long as she can putting Trudie to bed, washing the child’s face and unbraiding and brushing her hair, checking beneath her nails for dirt and even behind her ears, but eventually Trudie is settled yawning on her basement cot and there is nothing more to be done. Anna brushes her lips over Trudie’s forehead before pulling the string that turns off the light.
That’s right, little rabbit, she says. Go to sleep.
Then, her stomach heavy with food and dread, Anna walks slowly up the two flights to Mathilde’s room. The Obersturm-führer is standing by the window, although there is nothing to see as he has drawn the blackout shade. He has also lit the flame under the kerosene lamp on the nightstand.
He says nothing but turns his head to stare at Anna, which she takes as her cue to undress. When she is naked she lies down, teeth chattering. She has not kindled the fire in the WC stove, and the heat from the kitchen has done nothing to warm this room. Her breath is visible in the frosty air.
She waits, but the Obersturmführer remains silent, merely watching her over one shoulder, so Anna reaches for the threadbare blanket near the footboard.
Don’t, the Obersturmführer says.
He turns to face her, and Anna sees that his fly is unbuttoned. She glimpses a tuft of dark hair through the slit of his briefs, the sadly hanging flesh. He has been handling himself, to no avail.
As if unaware of the potential embarrassment of this, the Obersturmführer walks casually to the bed. He stands by Anna’s side, looking down at her.
Did you get enough to eat? he asks.
Anna nods.
Are you sure? No more complaints?
Anna shakes her head.
Good, says the Obersturmführer. Very good. For I should hate to think I was failing you in some way, Anna.
He starts to remove his belt and pauses. He takes his pistol from its holster and holds it thoughtfully in his hand.
Then he begins to trace Anna’s ribs with it. The muzzle bumps down the bones one by one as though he is playing a xylophone.
You are quite thin, he comments. I suppose that is why you also complain of the cold; you have too little fat . . . Are you cold, Anna?
Anna keeps her eyes fixed on his. His expression is polite, concerned. He is at his most dangerous when he is like this. She shakes her head again.
The Obersturmführer smiles, his eyes crinkling at the corners.
You must not lie to me, he says. I can tell you are.
He trails the Luger up Anna’s arms, across her breastbone, around her nipples, beneath the curve of her breasts, over her belly. The metal leaves gooseflesh in its wake.
You see? says the Obersturmführer, bending to blow on the tiny bumps. You are cold. But I will forgive you the lie. I know you said it only to please me. Didn’t you?
The pistol pauses at the top of Anna’s thighs, nuzzling, moving back and forth, a cat’s tail switching.
You are so unlike any other woman I have ever known in this respect, adds the Obersturmführer. Always. Wanting. Only. To please. Me.
His tone is dreamy, distracted. He is for once not looking at Anna’s face. Instead he gazes at the Luger, which with each word he is wedging further between her legs. Anna feels nothing. She has come untethered from herself now, so separate that she is unable to summon any of her usual comforting fantasies. She floats above the bed like a bride in a painting she once saw, long since classified as the degenerate work of a Jew: Chagall, the artist’s name was.
And I know what pleases you, the Obersturmführer continues, still sounding as though he is speaking to himself. This. This. There. You like that, do you? No, don’t answer. I can tell you do. I’m going to keep using it until you come. And don’t fake it, either. You know I can tell when you do.
A few minutes pass in complete silence but for the Ober-sturmführer ’s increasingly labored breathing and the quicker rhythm of Anna’s own.
There, he says, working at her with his free hand. There. There—At the moment of climax he pulls the trigger.
Bang! he says.
Anna gives a small shriek and lies shuddering, staring at the ceiling.
The Obersturmführer slips the pistol from her and tosses it across the room. He climbs onto the bed to kneel above Anna.
Bang, he repeats, this time cocking a thumb and forefinger in imitation of the gun. He bends over Anna and studies her. Then he throws his head back and roars with laughter.
Your face, he gasps, when he is capable of speech. The look on your face!
He wipes tears from his eyes. Did you really think it was loaded? You really did, didn’t you? My poor silly girl.
And somehow this or Anna’s expression or the business with the pistol or a combination of the factors must have excited him, for the Obersturmführer is now at the ready. He becomes abruptly solemn and scrabbles to yank his trousers down.
I would never—, he says, pushing into Anna, —never use—a loaded gun— with you— of all people— the way— you go off— like a pistol— yourself— three, four times— in a row—like a rocket. It makes—a man—feel—like a god. If only Eisele knew— that smug— prick— with— all his bragging— about enforced— impotence— if he only knew— about you—Anna— he’d know— something— much! more! important!—
The Obersturmführer shouts and pulls Anna’s hair. He falls forward, panting. When he has regained his breath, he clambers off her and reaches for his trousers.
You are my cure, he mutters, you have cured me . . . Ach, what’s this?
Something has fallen with a clatter from his pocket. The Obersturmführer comes back to the bed and presses it into Anna’s stomach, and she hisses in a breath: whatever it is, it is made of metal, and cold.
I have been meaning to give this to you for months now, says the Obersturmführer. Stupid of me to have forgotten.
He retrieves his Luger from the corner and walks to the door.
I suppose I am growing forgetful in my old age, eh, Anna? he adds, and laughs as he leaves, high good humor restored.
When she hears him clank
ing plates about in the kitchen, his appetite postcoitally stimulated, Anna sits up gingerly, wincing and sore. She examines the sheet beneath her, streaked with oil from the Obersturmführer ’s pistol. She will boil and scrub, wring and scour, but she suspects nothing will get it out, not lye nor salt nor bleach. No household manual, no exchange of feminine wisdom, has prepared her to vanquish this kind of stain.
From the thin torn cotton, Anna picks up the object the Obersturmführer has left on her belly and turns it over in her hands. It is a small gold case with the symbol of the Reich on its cover, the sort of container that might hold cigarettes. But when Anna opens it, she finds instead a photograph, a portrait of herself and Trudie and the Obersturmführer. Taken, Anna recalls now, during her surprise twenty-third birthday expedition, in the Park an der Ilm. After they had eaten and returned to the Mercedes.
Still naked, shivering convulsively, Anna huddles over the photograph. She brings it close to her eyes, squinting in the weak light of the kerosene lamp. In the portrait the Obersturmführer is standing behind her as she sits with the child in her lap, his hand on Anna’s shoulder. Is this pose casual? Possessive? Proud? The brim of his cap hides his face so that she cannot read it.
What does it mean, this gift? Does the Obersturmführer truly care for her after all? Or is it merely a bauble, the sort of thing he might give to any girl he had taken as a mistress? His cure; he has said Anna is his cure. He has said he will never harm her. Or has he? Anna tries to remember his monologue of a few minutes earlier. No; he has said he would never use a loaded gun on her. A different matter entirely. He has made no promises, and Anna is no better off; she is no closer to understanding him than she was when he arrived for dinner nor even a few months before.
Pulling a blanket around her shoulders, Anna hobbles painfully to the bureau, on which she sets the case—propped open in the event that the Obersturmführer should return to the room. She stares at his image. Does she exist for him at all outside of bed? away from the bakery? The stiff little uniformed fig ure tells her nothing. Perhaps, Anna thinks, if one were able to open the Obersturmführer the same way one can this hinged frame in which his likeness is contained, undoing a latch to swing his face aside, one would find only a dark space. Nothing behind it. Nothing at all.
42
WERE MATHILDE STILL ALIVE, SHE WOULD BE AGHAST over the condition of her beloved bakery. The lathing is exposed where plaster has fallen from the walls during the air raids, the shattered window covered with the boards of a dismantled crate. The portrait of the Führer that the Obersturmführer brought for Anna to hang behind the register has likewise suffered: a diagonal crack in the glass bisects the leader’s face, so that he appears to be looking in two directions at once. The pages of the calendar have long since been conscripted for service as toilet paper, the beginning of 1945 swirling down the pipes of the WC.
The refugees are in worse shape than their temporary haven. When the cellar and the kitchen are occupied, they sleep on the floor in their threadbare coats amid puddles of snowmelt, filling the bakery with the stench of wet wool and unwashed bodies. Anna spends her days catering to the visitors and keeping Trudie from them. At first it is a relief to have the girl entertained; an elderly gentleman, a former schoolmaster, begins teaching Trudie her ABC’s. But one afternoon Trudie does not respond when called, and a frantic search finds her halfway down the road, struggling in the clutches of a woman who screams, She’s mine! You stole her from me! and fights with the strength of dementia when Anna pries Trudie away. The refugees from Dresden are the worst, however, with their staring eyes and hair burned in piebald patches. Sometimes Anna sweeps up the shreds of themselves they have left like discarded snakeskins on the floor.
Yet Anna is grateful for this miserable company. These people know nothing about her; they don’t sneer or dart fearful looks in her direction; they view her solely as a source of bread, bandaging, or shelter. Anna much prefers the role of hostess to that of the Obersturmführer ’s whore. She misses the refugees when the Obersturmführer appears and orders them out, sending them into the frigid February nights. He hates to seem hardhearted, he explains to Anna, but he simply cannot relax amid such chaos. He prefers the company of his little adopted family.
Anna stands in the storefront one evening, sorting the refugees’ goods into piles. It is astonishing, what they have been willing to trade for accommodation. The display case and the floor are heaped with offerings. All gold jewelry is stashed in one of the Obersturmführer ’s trunks. Another is reserved for silver. Into a Wehrmacht footlocker go miscellaneous items of value, such as pots, pans, furs, and the occasional Oriental rug. The Obersturm-führer has unsentimentally requested that Anna remove photographs from their valuable frames, but he hasn’t ordered her to dispose of them. Sometimes, when sleep evades her, Anna squanders a candle in order to flip through the couples posing stiffly on their wedding day, the groupings of children, the spinster with her cat on her lap.
What about this? she asks now, holding up a tapestry for the Obersturmführer ’s inspection. The brocade looks like gold, but I can’t tell in this light.
He shrugs. Use your best judgment, he says. He is distracted by Trudie, whom he is teaching to march.
Hup-one, he says. Hup-two. Hup-two-three-four.
Anna runs her fingers over the material. It glitters even in the stingy light shed by the hurricane lantern the Obersturmführer has bought from the camp. She folds the cloth and places it in the footlocker atop a length of silk, in which she has wrapped a crystal decanter. The Obersturmführer is partial to crystal. Again Anna wonders what he does with these spoils. What good are they when the only true currency is the food that is in such short supply? One can’t eat heirlooms, after all.
Hup, hup, hup, the Obersturmführer says to Trudie. Now turn. No, not like that. Here, watch.
He marches across the room, his boots thudding on the floor. He pivots, goose-steps back to Trudie, and clicks his heels.
Heil Hitler! he says, saluting.
Heil Hitler, says the girl, mimicking the gesture.
The Obersturmführer bends to touch her nose with a finger. Very good, he says. Now you do it.
Hup, hup, hup, says Trudie, stamping around the bakery. Despite the lack of rations, she continues to grow rapidly; her legs, as skinny as her father’s, look like those of a stork.
Watching her, Anna is reminded of the sorcerer and his apprentice. She can’t abide this game any longer.
Do you know, Horst, people will trade the strangest things for food, she says loudly. Just this week a woman tried to give me her pet schnauzer. What did she think I would do with it?
She laughs. I could always have eaten it, I suppose.
Her gambit doesn’t work. The Obersturmführer is not listening.
Lift your feet, he commands. Bend your arm at the elbow. Hup! Hup! Hup!
Trudie shuttles back and forth in front of the Obersturm-führer. That’s better, he says, that’s much better; there’s a good little soldier.
Clapping, he bursts into the Horst Wessel song:
Raise high the flags!
Stand rank on rank together.
Storm troopers march with quiet, steady tread.
Millions, full of hope, look toward the swastika;
The day breaks for freedom and for bread.
I think that’s enough for one evening, Anna calls. It’s past the child’s bedtime.
But the Obersturmführer is truly carried away now. He taps time with a foot, singing in his faulty baritone. His voice cracks; his face contorts as though he is suppressing gas, and Anna sees to her amazement that he is about to cry. His colorless eyes brim with tears.
Raise high the knife!
Sharpen the blade to cut the Jewish flesh.
Jewish blood will run in the gutters;
On every corner the Hitler flag will flutter—
Horst, Anna says, I really don’t think—
The Obersturmführer rounds on her.<
br />
WILL you be quiet! he roars. WILL you for once in your Godforsaken life just! shut! up!
Trudie, shocked into sudden immobility, stares at him and then begins to howl.
Stop that! the Obersturmführer screams.
He raises a hand and clouts the girl across the face. She goes spinning to the floor. The Obersturmführer rakes the same hand through his hair and paces, muttering.
Anna pushes past him and drops to her knees beside her daughter. Trudie is silent, and Anna is certain that the Ober-sturmführer has snapped the fragile little neck. But then the girl sucks air into her lungs and lets it out in a wail. Anna gathers her onto her lap and rocks her.
And shut that brat up, the Obersturmführer shouts from above. Wheeling, he sweeps an arm across the display case. Anna huddles over Trudie, trying to shield her from the shower of jewelry and silverware and candlesticks and china.
Jesus Christ, she’s worse than an air-raid siren, the Obersturm-führer rants. Of all the spoiled—disobedient—What does a man have to do nowadays for some peace and quiet? Just a second’s worth of order!
Shhh, Anna says to Trudie, cupping the girl’s face to feel for damage. One cheek is already puffy, blood welling from a cut inflicted by the Obersturmführer ’s death’s-head ring. But he doesn’t seem to have broken any bones, and the teeth are still intact. Shhh. Be quiet now.
Trudie tries to swallow her sobs. The Obersturmführer ’s boots pass back and forth a few centimeters from Anna’s nose. Glass crunches and grinds beneath them. A young bride, still in her frame, smiles at Anna from the shards.