Letters From the Lost (14 page)

“I had to come,”
Erni said.
“I have heard about you ever since I was born. My mother has never stopped talking about you, and about the terrible loss that seemed to leave a hole in her heart.”

Erni and I found that we had much in common, including a reluctance to upset our mothers by asking questions about the past. Erni and her husband Rudi took time off from work to show me Germany. I learned to drink
Hefeweizen
from tall glasses, and to order German dishes that featured more meat than I would normally eat in a month. Arm in arm, Tini and I walked through picturesque towns where geraniums cascaded from every window, where cobbled streets led to historic houses where my favourite poets had once dwelt, where coffee houses and the aroma of freshly baked pastries invited us to linger. To linger and to talk.

It was with real reluctance that I left Tini and her family. She had mothered me in ways that I had missed. For many years, I had experienced myself as parent to my mother, and the recent period of care giving had strengthened that feeling. Tini was able to provide a different kind of love, an unconditional love that I ate up as eagerly as her freshly baked
Vanil-lakipferln.

————

My family expands to include Tini, Erni and Rudi
From left to right: Erni, Rudi, Helen, Tini

TINI CONFIRMED WHAT I HAD
learned in Linz about the Fränkels.

“They often visited
,” she told me.
“There would be great excitement as we got the house ready. ‘The Linzers are coming,’ your grandmother would say. They usually stayed overnight, so I would air all the sheets and bedding and iron the good tablecloths as well as doing some extra cooking and baking. Your grandmother always pitched in, so I never minded the work.”

She knew no details about the later years, only that she’d heard Frau Martha was expecting a baby. After my family fled, Tini had gone to live nearby with her own parents. She knew nothing further.

Tini did know something about my father’s sister Else and her husband. He bore the same name as his brother-in-law Emil, but Else’s husband was a doctor.
Herr Doktor Emil Urbach.
He was a renowned specialist and people travelled great distances to consult him. The Urbachs lived in Krumlau, a medieval town popular with visitors from abroad. Tini had been quite in awe of him.

Frau Else had been more approachable, and she often came into the kitchen. Despite being a very elegant lady, always carefully coiffed and attired, she never put on airs. Tini said that on the contrary, Else was very easy to talk to, even if their conversation was rather limited. Still, Tini liked the polite way in which Frau Else always couched her requests:
“Only if you have time, dear Tini. I know how busy you are. Tini, my mother always says that neither she nor my sister-in-law Gretl could manage without you.”

On the last evening of my visit, Tini again fetched the postcard my mother had sent to her from Prague. This time, she pressed it into my hands and told me it was mine.

The card is addressed to Fraulein Christine Trinko, Erdweis bei Gmünd, Sudetenland. The postal stamp is smudged, but the words remain clear.

Prague, November 18, 1938.

Dear Tini

I have written to you several times in Strobnitz, but have received no reply. Now I shall write to your homeland. Perhaps my card will reach you there. If so, please send me a few lines. You know of course that we want to know how you are and what you are doing and whether you are perhaps still in Strobnitz after all and what’s new there. We speak a lot about the past. It is all so sad, and yet there is nothing we can do to change it. Helly so often speaks of Tini. The child has not forgotten you nor have we.

We are living here temporarily in very modest circumstances. If you write to me, please address to Ing. Arnold Waldstein, Prague XII, Fochova 20.

What will you do now? Will you accept another position or will you get married right away? You know that I have always been interested in everything that pertains to you and I would like to have some share in your future life, even if at a distance. In any case, I wish you all the best of luck.

You will be interested to know that Aunt Anny and her husband left for Canada/America three weeks ago. We want to go there soon too, but there are still lots of formalities to be completed. My dear
parents are in Pilsen and Mother is very sick. Her nerves are very poor as a result of the departure.

I believe that if we could be together, we’d have lots to tell each other. Life in Strobnitz was so pleasant (gemütlich). Please be sure to write to me. Give my regards to your parents. Best regards to you from my husband.

Sincerely,
Gretel Waldstein

————

BEFORE LEAVING GERMANY
, there was one more stop I felt compelled to make. Not far from Tini’s home in Ehningen lies Cham, my mother’s hometown.

“Cham,”
the conductor announced.
“The next station is Cham. Arrival in three minutes.”

As passengers folded their newspapers and assembled their belongings, I pulled my suitcase from the overhead rack and moved to the aisle. Having had such great luck on the train to Ehningen, I again tried the approach of speaking to a woman waiting to get off the train.

“Excuse me, are you from Cham?”

“Yes, but I haven’t lived here long. Do you live here too?”

“No, I’m just visiting. I was hoping you might know of a good Gasthof where I could spend the night.”

“Sorry, I can’t help you, but there is a small tourist agency just across from the station. The woman who owns it is very helpful. She is an old-time resident who will be able to advise you. You should just be able to catch her before the shops close.”

Having expressed my thanks, I hastened across the street to a white frame building with travel posters in the window. A welcoming light still burned in the gathering dusk. A bell tinkled to announce my entry.

“Good evening. How can I help you?”

“I’m sorry; I don’t need travel information, just a place to stay here in Cham.”

“Of course. There are many residents who rent out rooms. Cham is gaining popularity as a resort destination because we are so close to lakes and forests. Will you be staying long?”

“No, just for one night.”

“Oh, so you aren’t on holiday. Are you perhaps visiting someone?”

“No.”

An awkward silence ensued. The woman clearly expected further details.

“My mother is from Cham. My grandparents lived here.”

“Oh, but your mother didn’t come with you. Where is she now?”

“In Canada.”

“In Canada! But you speak German. And your mother didn’t come with you?”

“No.”

“You came alone? Didn’t she want to come? Surely, she would want to show you where she used to live. Perhaps some of her old friends are still living here.”

“No.”

Another awkward silence. I tried again.

“My mother will not set foot in Germany. Her memories are bad. She left here in 1939.”

“1939? Then she was lucky. That was just before the war. She would have missed all the horror. Cham doesn’t have much industry, so we didn’t get those terrible bombings, but we had very little food, and many of our soldiers and civilians suffered dreadfully. Your mother escaped all that. How could she have bad memories?”

I see no way out except the terrible truth.

“My mother is Jewish. My grandparents were Jewish.”

I am aware of being looked at with wide-eyed wonder. I suddenly realize that I may be the first Jew that this forty-something woman has ever set eyes upon. Most of the handful of Germany’s Jews who survived chose to settle elsewhere after the war.

“What a shame that my own mother isn’t in the shop today. Sometimes she helps me. She may have known your mother. What is her family name?”

“Grünhut.”

“I don’t recognize it. There’s only one Jew living in Cham now. Everybody knows him. His name is Max Weissglas.”

I shifted uncomfortably. A single Jew in a town that once held dozens of Jewish families. Like the last of any species, his name is known to all. My mind flipped back to a short story in our high school English class, “The Last of the passenger pigeons.” At one time, there were so many passenger pigeons in America that trains would stop to allow gentleman travellers to stretch their legs and shoot at a sky that was clouded with birds. Then, one day, the last passenger pigeon died and the species was extinct.

A single Jew left in Cham. I could not banish the words from my mind. Soon after arriving at the recommended Gasthaus, I searched through the thin telephone book, and dialled the number for Max Weissglas.

Before I knew what I was going to say, a woman answered. My words simply tumbled out.

“Good evening. I’m a visitor from Canada. My mother was from Cham and my grandparents lived here. They were Jews. When I asked the woman at the travel agency by the railway station for the name of a guesthouse, she gave me the name of Max Weissglas and told me that he is the only Jew in Cham. I would like to meet him, but I’m only here till tomorrow. Is it possible?”

Another long silence. I listened but heard only the thumping of my own heart. At last, the woman sighed deeply, and then asked me to call again in the morning. We agreed to a 9 o’clock call.

Next morning, the same woman answered my call.

“What are your plans for the day?”

“I want to walk around town in the morning, but I don’t imagine that will take long. Cham does not appear to be a large town. After that, I’ll be free until late afternoon when my train leaves. Could we meet for coffee?”

“Where are you staying?”

“Gasthaus Zum Weissen Schwan. It’s near a bridge over the river.”

“I know it. I will meet you at noon in the foyer.”

I was puzzled by this option and by the fact that she made all the arrangements. Why had she not put Max Weissglas on the phone? Still, I agreed.

My exploration of the town did not take long. Like so many European towns, it is built around a town square with a fountain at its centre. A
plaque at its base told me that this fountain is called the
Hexenbrunnen,
the Witches Well. It features a set of bronze witches chasing peasants who are too weak to resist the hex that both draws and pursues them. I found the fountain irritating and irksome. Its modern design dwells uneasily in the ancient square. Besides, blaming evil on witches always triggers my feminist sensibilities. This fountain stirs up an even deeper sensitivity. Is the town attempting to blame its complicity during the war on witchcraft? Has the town revived this ancient denial of responsibility and given it a new twist?

Hexenbrunnen
, the Witches Well

The voice of conscience is not far away. Commanding the square is an old stone church that dominates both space and time. Hanging in its tall onion tower is a great bronze bell that is seldom silent. When its deep voice is not reminding townsfolk of the hour and the quarter hour, it is calling them to prayer. I could neither ignore the centrality of the church nor escape its tolling reminder of mortality. For me, each bong carried the name of a Jew for whom Death had come at the hands of the townspeople.

Opposite the church squats a sedate building, prim and orderly as befits the municipal hall. In between, there are small stores, a bank, and several cafés. Their brightly checked tablecloths and umbrellas beckoned, but few clients were sipping coffee in the morning sunshine.

With thoughts of my mother occupying my mind, I wandered disconsolately along the path that follows the curve of the Regen River. My mother had often complained that every Sunday afternoon, she and Anny had been forced to accompany their parents as they strolled sedately along that very path, greeting neighbours and embodying respectability I gazed up at the distinctive twin towers of the medieval Beer-gate and wondered why my mother had never mentioned this unique landmark. I walked past the convent grounds and the adjacent school where Gretl and Anny had sat on a hard wooden bench learning discipline and the ABCs from unsmiling nuns. Just past the convent, I found the small street of shops with the address my mother had given me:
Fuhrmanstrasse, Number 11