Finding Rebecca: A Novel of Love and the Holocaust (28 page)

“Were
you planning to keep it from her?” Stefan replied.

Christopher
looked at Alexandra. She looked thin, the lines on her face far more pronounced
than they should have been for a 23 year-old. Her eyes had dulled and her hair
was lifeless and limp. He picked up the empty cup in front of him and held it
up, regarding the intricate patterns on the china. They were still silent when
Steffi came in with the pot of coffee. She set it down on the table with a
smile and backed out slowly without saying a word. Stefan picked up the coffee
pot and poured for each of them. He spoke again. “Are you safe there?”

“Yes,
quite safe. I am getting quite adept at hiding my true self.” Christopher tried
to smile, but instead felt the pain inside contorting his face. “As long as I
keep the money flowing I will be safe.”

“Is
there news of Rebecca?” Alexandra asked.

“No, not
yet, my contacts are still looking.”

“I’m
sure she’s out there,” Stefan said.

“I hope
so. What of Uli?”

“Nothing,
no letters, no word from the Wehrmacht. He’s still on the Eastern Front.”

“How
many people are dying in the camp?” Alexandra said, raising her hand to her
mouth. “I just can’t believe it. I cannot believe that they could do this. It’s
monstrous. I knew the Jews were gone, but nobody ever talks about them, as if
they just disappeared into nothing.”

“I’ve
seen close to sixty thousand die, maybe more. That’s in the eight weeks I’ve
been there. It’s like no circle of hell I ever could have imagined. Somehow
finding Rebecca doesn’t seem enough anymore.” Alexandra was visibly shocked. It
felt good to talk about it, like pouring water over the massive fire inside.
“I’ve tried to help the ladies that work for me. There are six hundred of them.
I’m trying to keep them alive.”

“But now
you want to do more,” Stefan asserted.

“Yes, I
have to.”

“But
what if the SS find out that you’re helping the prisoners?” Alexandra asked.

“I’ll be
executed.” Christopher looked at his sister as she began to cry. “But I think
that I’d choose that over doing nothing. I couldn’t live the rest of my life
knowing that I did nothing.”

There
was silence in the room, the only noise that of the cars on the road outside
until Stefan broke the quiet. “Is there anyone in there you can talk to? Any
confidant? What do the other SS think of what goes on there?”
 

“There’s
no one. The other SS think they’re doing a job for the Reich, for the world.
They’re deluded enough, poisoned enough, to believe what they’re doing is
justified.” Christopher looked around the room and took a sip of coffee. It was
too hot and it burnt his lip. “It’s amazing what years of conditioning and
propaganda can achieve, and I often wonder if I’d be the same as them if I’d
been subjected to the same.”

“You
could never be like them.” Stefan said.

“I don’t
know. If I do nothing, I’m no different than they are. Carrying out orders,
that’s all the other SS men are doing there. There are plenty of killers,
people who love what they do there, but most of the SS are passive, just doing
a job, a job where the end product is the ashes of innocent people.”

Alexandra
went to speak but stopped, as if the words refused to leave her mouth. She put
her head into her hands. Christopher reached over to her. Her hand was cold as
he held it on the table.

“So,
what are you going to do?” his father asked. “You’re right; you do have to do
something.”

Christopher
bit down on his lip as he looked into his father’s eyes. “I really don’t know
what I can do. I do have the money, and there are no checks. There’s no one
after me to check the money. There’s a river, a monsoon, of money flowing
through the camp.”

“Use it,”
Stefan said.

“I think
we should slow down here, Christopher could be executed,” Alexandra asserted. They
both looked at her. “I just think he needs to be careful.”

“I’ve
already banned any summary executions in my section of the camp. There have
been no workers shot in my warehouses for a month.”

“That’s
good. Is there anything else?” Stefan asked.

“There
has to be something I can do for them.”

“You’re right, Christopher, there has
to be.” Alexandra said.

Christopher
sat perfectly upright, absolutely still, outside Lagerkommandant Höss‚Äôs
office. It had been surprisingly easy to get the appointment. It seemed the
Lagerkommandant was eager to meet up with him once more. Christopher coughed
and smoothed out his collar, although he knew it was absolutely pristine from
the time he had spent pressing and repressing it. He ran his hands over the
smooth skin of his face and smiled across at Höss‚Äôs secretary who smiled
back. Höss‚Äôs office was just outside the fence of Auschwitz I, and right
beside the administration building where the Economic Agency’s official but
rarely used offices sat. The door opened. It was Höss.

There
was nothing extraordinary about this man, the Commandant of all of this. He was
of medium height, smaller than Christopher. He had a full head of brown hair.
There was nothing striking or outstanding about his face, no scars or war
wounds. He was completely average, a man in his early forties, the type of man
one passes on the street without passing a glance at or paying any attention
to, yet he was the master of all this horror and death. Christopher felt
physically ill just looking at him, but he smiled and gave the rigid Nazi
salute. Höss nodded his head and gave a lazy salute back to the young
Obersturmf√ºhrer. Christopher entered the room as Höss directed him and
took a seat in a plush red leather chair, one of three facing Höss‚Äôs
massive leather-topped desk. The portrait of Hitler was looking down on them as
Höss began.

“I was
in Berlin last week,” he said, lighting up a cigarette. He offered Christopher
one from a sterling silver cigarette case. Christopher accepted and reached in.
The initials engraved on the inside of the box were not Höss‚Äôs. ‚ÄúI met
with
Standartenführer
Kohl, of the SS headquarters. I believe he is your contact?”

“Yes, yes, he is. I’ve met him twice
now.” Christopher looked at
Höss
across the table, the smoke from his cigarette billowed into the air. His eyes
were unreadable. Christopher wondered how much Kohl was skimming off the top
for himself, and wondered if
Höss
was
after the same thing. “I’ve not had the chance to meet him properly yet…”

“Yes, he’s a charming fellow. I’ve
known him quite a while now. Are you a member of the Party yourself, Seeler?”

“No, I’m not.”

Höss
picked a file off the desk in front
of him. “Yes, I remember seeing that in your file. You’re from….”

“Jersey, Herr
Lagerkommandant
.” Christopher was sitting rigid,
stiff as an oak tree. He thought of the dead, the festering bodies awaiting
cremation and felt his insides tighten.

“Yes, of course. You were liberated
in 1940. No divided loyalties, I hope?”

“None whatsoever, Herr
Lagerkommandant
.”

“Of course not,”
Höss
said throwing down the file. “There’s
no room for that here, where the most important work in the entire Reich is
taking place. Standartenführer Kohl tells me that production is up,
significantly up, since you began here.”
Höss
didn’t change his expression, his eyes fixed on Christopher’s. “Berlin is
happy, and that makes me happy.”

“I’m glad, Herr Lagerkommandant.”

“Yes, I joined the party in 1922
myself.” He was looking past Christopher now, as if peering back to those
halcyon days.

“I read about your record in the last
war, how you were one of the youngest non-commissioned officers in the German
Army, and I know you started off as a concentration camp guard yourself in
‘34.”
 
Höss
didn’t answer, seemingly happy to let Christopher continue. “My own father
served in the war also, I’m grateful now for my opportunity to serve the
Fatherland.”

Höss
pushed the smoke out of his mouth. “I’m glad to see such dedication. I have
been most impressed by the work you’ve done in the Economic Agency so far. But,
as you know, I am a busy man. What is it that you’ve come to see me about
today?”

Christopher
raised his hands in front of his face and pressed his fingers together.
“There’s been something troubling me ever since I arrived in the camp.”

The
Lagerkommandant’s face didn’t change as he sat back in his leather chair. “And
what might that be, Obersturmführer Seeler?”

Christopher
paused for a few seconds, Höss‚Äôs words swirling around him. ‚ÄúCorruption,
Herr Lagerkommandant.‚Äù Höss‚Äôs eyes widened and then narrowed in less than
a second and a scowl began to crawl across his face. “Now I have no idea what
went on in my department before my arrival, and I certainly don’t want to pass
judgment on my fellow SS soldiers who operate in the Economic Agency, but I
have heard some things, and seen some things also.” Christopher glanced down at
the cigarette case, but then jerked his eyes back upwards as if they were burnt
by the sight of it. It took him a couple of seconds to look the Commandant in
the eyes again.

“It’s a
sickness,‚Äù Höss said shaking his head. ‚ÄúI have little doubt that it‚Äôs a
disease spread by the Jew himself, the sickness of greed. It’s true that some
of the men have succumbed to it. It’s up to men like you, dedicated SS officers
to provide the example these men need.”

“That’s
what I’m here to speak to you about.”

“Go on.”

“There
has to be a tighter system of checks and balances put in place. Too much wealth
is being lost before it has the chance to make it back to the Reich, to where
it can do the most good.” Christopher put his hands back in his lap and looked
up at the portrait of Hitler on the wall and then back at Höss. ‚ÄúThere
needs to be someone on the ground with access to the ledgers, to the monies, to
the warehouses, and who can watch over the prisoners, and yes, the guards
themselves, to make sure that any improprieties are stubbed out as soon as they
occur.‚Äù Höss let a smile spread across his lips, but Christopher kept
talking. “I have been watching the entire Economic Agency, every minute of
every day since my arrival, and I think that the results have been evident. But
it’s still not enough. I estimate that ten per cent, or more, of all the wealth
to be apportioned to the Reich never arrives. I have worked out that for every
two thousand prisoners that pass through the crematoria on a daily basis we
only collect about forty thousand Reichmarks, not including the gold and jewels
the prisoners are carrying. Logic dictates that the prisoners are carrying more
than this. They have to be. I want to make it my job, my responsibility, to
make sure that none of this wealth is lost.”

“Is this
not already your job, your responsibility?”

“It’s
one of the many roles that I undertake, but I want to be custodian of the
ledgers, to check and re-check the staff, the guards and the prisoners
themselves.” Christopher sat forward as he spoke, he could almost feel the fire
in his eyes. “I need a mandate to search any guard or any locker, any truck,
and under any bed of anyone I suspect of stealing and hoarding wealth meant for
the Reich.”

“You
want to take personal responsibility for all of the issues with corruption in
the Economic Agency?”

“Nothing
would make me happier, Herr Lagerkommandant.”

Höss
looked at Christopher through opaque eyes. “Corruption has been a problem in
the camp for too long now. I was speaking about it only last month with Herr
Himmler himself.”

“I would
like to make weekly reports about it, to you only. There should be no one else
involved. It’s too important an issue.”

“An interesting idea, Herr Obersturmführer,”
Höss
said as he stubbed out the cigarette. “It’s certainly something I would like to
think about.” He pressed his lips together before he continued. “A young
committed officer like you could do much to stem the insidious hand of
corruption.‚Äù Höss stood up and held out his hand. ‚ÄúWell done, Herr
Obersturmführer, give me some time and I will get back to you.”