Spark of Life (29 page)

“Is he dead?”

“Yes. At last. He still tried to make us take the new one out of his bunk. The one with the fever. He thought he’d catch something from him. Instead, he gave it to the other. He was wailing and growling again toward the end. The priest didn’t quite last out.”

509 nodded. “It’s difficult to die now. Earlier it was easier. Now it’s hard. So near the end.”

Berger sat down beside 509. It was after the evening meal. The Small camp had received only a thin soup; a mug each. No bread. “What did Handke want from you?” he asked.

509 opened his hands. “He gave me this. A clean sheet of notepaper and a fountain pen. He wants me to transfer my money in Switzerland to him. Not half of it. Everything. The whole five thousand francs.”

“And?”

“In return he promises to let me live for the time being. He even hinted at something like protection.”

“Until he gets your signature.”

“That’s until tomorrow evening. It’s already something. There have been times when we haven’t had so long.”

“It’s not enough, 509. We must find something else.”

509 shrugged his shoulders. “Maybe it’ll work. Maybe he thinks he’ll need me in order to get the money.”

“It could also be that he thinks the opposite. To get rid of you, so you can’t withdraw the signature.”

“I can’t withdraw it once he’s got it.”

“He doesn’t know that. Maybe you could do it. You gave it to him under pressure.”

509 was silent for a while. “Ephraim,” he then said calmly. “I don’t need to do that. I have no money in Switzerland.”

“What?”

“I haven’t one franc in Switzerland.”

Berger stared for some time at 509. “You invented all that?”

“Yes.”

Berger drew the back of his hand across his inflamed eyes. His shoulders twitched.

“What’s wrong?” asked 509. “Are you crying?”

“No, I’m laughing. It’s idiotic, but I’m laughing.”

“Go ahead, laugh. We’ve had damn little reason to laugh here.”

“I laughed thinking of Handke in Zurich. What on earth gave you that idea, 509?”

“I don’t know. Many things occur to one when one’s life is at stake. The main thing is he swallowed it. He can’t even find out until the war’s over. He simply has to believe it.”

“That’s true.” Berger’s face grew serious again. “That’s why I don’t trust him. He can get stir-crazy again and do something unexpected. We must take precautions. The best thing is for you to die.”

“Die? How? We haven’t any lazaret. How could we wangle that? This place is the last stop.”

“Via the last stop of all. The crematorium.”

509 looked at Berger. He looked at the worried face with the watering eyes and the narrow skull and he felt a wave of warmth. “Do you think that’s possible?”

“One can try it.”

509 didn’t ask how Berger planned to try it. “We can still talk about it,” he said. “For the present we have time. Today I’m going to transfer only two thousand five hundred francs to Handke. He’ll take the paper and demand the rest. In this way I gain a few days. Then I’ve still got Rosen’s twenty marks.”

“And when they’re gone?”

“Maybe before then something else will happen. One can think
only of the most immediate danger. One at a time. And one after the other. Otherwise one goes nuts.” 509 turned the notepaper and fountain pen from side to side. He watched the pale reflections on the pen. “Funny,” he said, “I haven’t had anything like these in my hand for a long time. Paper and pen. Once I lived by them. Will one ever be able to do that again?”

THE TWO HUNDRED
men of the new salvage gang had been distributed down the street in a long line. It was the first time they had been employed to clear up inside the town. So far they had been set to work only in the demolished factories of the suburbs.

The SS had occupied the street exits and also stationed squads as guards along the left-hand side. The bombs had fallen mainly on the right-hand side; walls and roofs had crashed across the roadway, rendering almost all traffic impossible.

The prisoners hadn’t enough picks and shovels; some of them had to work with their bare hands. The kapos and foremen were nervous; they weren’t sure whether to beat and drive the men on or to restrain themselves. Although civilians had been forbidden to use the street, the tenants living in the undamaged houses could not be evicted.

Lewinsky was working alongside Werner. Both had volunteered for the salvage gang with a number of other political prisoners whose lives were in danger. Although the work here was harder than anywhere else, it enabled them to avoid being seized in the camp by the SS in the daytime; in the evenings, after marching in
under cover of night, it was easier to make themselves scarce and go into hiding.

“Did you see the name of the street?” asked Werner under his breath.

“Yes.” Lewinsky grinned. The street was called the Hitler Strasse. “Sacred name. Wasn’t any use against bombs, though.”

They lugged a beam away. The backs of their striped jackets were dark with sweat. At the collecting place they ran into Goldstein. He had joined the gang despite his weak heart, and Werner and Lewinsky had done nothing to prevent him—he was in danger as a political prisoner. His face was gray. He sniffed the air. “It stinks here. Of corpses. Not of fresh ones—some old ones must still be lying here.”

“Sure!” They were familiar with it. They knew the smell of corpses. In this respect they were all experts.

They now piled broken-off stones against a wall. The mortar was cleared away in small carts. Behind them, on the other side of the street, was a grocery store. The windows had been blown out; but several posters and cardboard boxes had already been put back in the shop front. A man with a mustache looked out from behind them. He had one of those faces which in 1933 had been seen in large number marching behind placards bearing the inscription: D
ON
’
T
B
UY FROM
J
EWS
. His head seemed to be cut off by the rear wall of the shop window—resembling those cheap photographs on fair grounds where the customers’ heads perch above the painted uniforms of officers. This head appeared above empty boxes and dusty advertisements; the setting seemed to suit it.

In an undamaged doorway children were playing. Beside them stood a woman in a red blouse who watched the prisoners. Suddenly a few dogs broke out of the doorway and dashed across the street towards the prisoners. They sniffed their shoes and pants and one of them wagged its tail and leapt up at Number 7105. The
kapo supervising this section was at a loss what to do. The dog was a civilian dog and not a man; even so, it seemed improper for it to befriend a prisoner, particularly in the presence of the SS. 7105 knew still less what to do. He did the only thing a prisoner can. He behaved as though the animal did not exist. But the dog followed him; it had taken a sudden liking to him. 7105 bent down and worked with intense eagerness. He was worried; the dog could mean his death.

“Get out of here, you lousy cur!” shouted the kapo at last, raising his truncheon. He had made up his mind. It was always better to be tough when the SS were looking on. The dog, however, paid no attention to him; it leapt and danced again around 7105. I was a big liver-and-white German pointer.

The kapo picked up some stones and threw them at it. The first stone struck 7105 on the knee; only the third one caught the dog full in the stomach. The dog howled, leapt aside and barked at the kapo. The kapo picked up the nearest rock. “Go to hell, you monster!”

The dog ducked but didn’t run away. It turned swiftly and leapt at the kapo. The man collapsed on a heap of mortar and the dog promptly stood over him, growling. “Help!” howled the kapo, and didn’t move. The SS-men laughed.

The woman in the red blouse came running out. She whistled to the dog. “Come here! Here at once! Oh, that dog! Always getting us into trouble!”

She dragged it off and into the doorway. “He ran out,” she said fearfully to the nearest SS-man. “Please! I didn’t see him! He ran away! He’ll get a good hiding for it!”

The SS-man grinned. “He could have taken a chunk out of that silly mug for all I care!”

The woman smiled feebly. She had thought the kapo belonged to the SS. “Thanks! Many thanks! I’ll chain him up at once!”

She dragged the dog away by the collar but suddenly began stroking it. The kapo brushed the chalk dust off his pants. The SS guards were still grinning. “Why didn’t you bite it?” shouted one of them to the kapo.

The kapo didn’t answer. That was always best. He went on dusting himself for a while. Then he angrily stamped over towards the prisoners. 7105 was busily trying to drag out a toilet from under a heap of stones and mortar. “Get on, you lazy cur!” hissed the kapo, and kicked him in the back of the knee. All the prisoners watched the kapo out of the corners of their eyes. The SS-man who had talked to the woman strolled over. He approached the kapo from behind and gave him a kick with his boot. “Leave that one alone! It’s not his fault. Bite the dog instead, you night owl!”

Surprised, the kapo turned round. The rage faded from his face and gave way to a servile grimace. “Of course! I only meant—”

“Get going!” The kapo received another kick in the belly, stood half at attention, and trundled off. The SS-man strolled back.

“Did you see that?” Lewinsky whispered to Werner.

“Signs and wonders! Maybe he did it because of the civilians.”

The prisoners continued surreptitiously to watch the other side of the street, and the other side of the street watched them. Although they were separated from one another by only a few yards, the distance was greater than if they had been living on different continents. Most of the prisoners were seeing the town from close quarters for the first time since they had been in camp. Once again they were seeing people going about their daily business. It was like seeing things happening on Mars.

A servant girl in a blue dress with white spots was cleaning the unbroken windows of an apartment. Her sleeves were rolled up and she was singing. In another window stood an old woman with white hair. The sun fell on her face and on the drawn curtains and the pictures in the room. She looked sadly at the prisoners. On the
corner of the street was a pharmacy. The pharmacist stood in front of the door and yawned. A woman in a leopard-skin coat walked down the street, close to the houses. She wore green gloves and shoes. The SS on the corner had let her pass. She was young and stepped nimbly over the heaps of rubble. Many of the prisoners hadn’t seen a woman for years. They all noticed her but only Lewinsky stared after her.

“Look out!” whispered Werner. “Lend me a hand here.”

He was pointing at a piece of material which stuck out from under the rubble. “There’s someone buried here.”

They shoveled the mortar and stones aside. There emerged from underneath a completely smashed face with a bloody, chalk-smeared beard. Beside it a hand was visible. The man had probably raised it to protect himself when the building collapsed.

The SS-men on the other side of the street were shouting provocative jokes at the daintily tripping girl in the leopard-skin coat. She laughed and made eyes at them. Then the sirens began to howl.

The pharmacist on the corner vanished into his shop. The girl in the leopard-skin coat started and ran back. She stumbled over a rubble heap and fell; her stockings tore and her green gloves were white with chalk dust. The prisoners had straightened themselves. “Stand still! Anyone moving will be shot!” The SS came running from the street corners. “Close ranks! Form fours, double march!”

The prisoners weren’t sure which command to obey. A few shots rang out. The SS guards from the street corners finally drove them together into one group. The squad leaders deliberated what they should do. It was only the first warning; but they all kept looking up anxiously. The radiant sky seemed to have become at once brighter and darker.

Now the other side of the street grew more lively. People, unseen before, came out of the houses. Children screamed. The grocer with the mustache dashed out of his shop, and crept like a fat maggot
over the ruins. A woman in a plaid shawl carried a parrot in a cage, carefully stretched out before her. The white-haired woman had disappeared. The servant girl, skirts raised high, ran from the door. Lewinsky’s eyes followed her. Between the black stockings and the taut blue panties gleamed the white skin of her legs. Suddenly everything was reversed: the peaceful quiet on the side of freedom had all of a sudden vanished; people rushed in terror from their apartments and ran for their lives to the air-raid shelters; whereas on the opposite side the prisoners stood silent and calm in front of the ruined walls and watched them.

One of the squad leaders seemed to notice this. “Whole division about turn!” he commanded. The prisoners now stared at the ruins. The debris glared in the sun. In only one of the bombed houses had a passage to a cellar been cleared. Here could be seen steps, an entrance gate, a dark corridor and a shaft of light from an exit leading from the rear.