The Luck of the Weissensteiners (The Three Nations Trilogy) (15 page)

“No one is even going to think about his nose with his bl
ond hair and she can easily pass for a gentile woman too,” he insisted. “No one ever sees them outside the farm. Who would be looking for them anyway? We are Germans, everyone knows that. They gave us the Jewish farm to look after, what more reassurance do you need?  I have thought about this, I know that they are a small risk, but I want to keep them here, it is only right. At least for now.”

“It has nothing to do with right or wrong,” Johanna said agitatedly. “Have you not heard what is going on in Germany? Just because it has not happened here yet does not mean it won't come. Any association with Jews now could damage our prospects in the future, even though
at the moment there are no explicit laws against what we are doing. In Germany we would be blacklisted and boycotted or arrested. Is that what you want, just because of some cute looking boy and his Jewish mother? Benedikt, please, tell them to go. We have our own children to worry about. She has got family in Bratislava, let them take care of her.”

“I thought you liked her?” he asked
, surprised at her vehemence.

Of course Johanna liked Greta but s
ince Wilhelm had left she had found the woman more of a burden than a help. “I don't like her enough to risk my future in a new Germany, a new Europe, even a New World,” she replied. “We are on the winning side. Let’s not risk that. Think of your children and what they would have to lose. We have nothing to fear from the new government unless through our association with her. Wilhelm divorced her which means he is in the clear. I love Ernst just as much you do but he will never fit in with us here. Someone will find out eventually. We can't hide them forever. We always said we would look after them until we know where the Jewish situation is going. Now that we know, we have to go our separate ways. How can you not see this?”

“It is true, we only committed ourselves to loo
k after them for a little while,” admitted Benedikt. “That doesn't mean that we have to stop. I really doubt that anybody would be interested in our farm and a blond child on it. Everyone has seen them at church and gradually some of the Germans on this farm moved back to Berlin; that is all the Slovaks are thinking. They haven't seen her relatives here for years. I am not sure anyone has even seen her. You are hysterical. I don't know why you want her to hide, if you ask me, that arouses much more suspicion.”

“Even the smallest of chances is too much to take, can't you see that?” she insisted. “We don't even know what connections the Weissensteiners have to other Jews. Jonah claims they have none but who can be sure?
What if some of our workers overheard us?”

“
You are being too anxious. Greta and Ernst are safe here and so are we.”

“If Greta knew that Wilhelm divorced her I swear she would want t
o leave here anyway,” Johanna persisted.  “She would want to be with her own people, not with the family of a coward who dumped her. What would she want from us now? I did not tell her because like you I felt responsible for Wilhelm and Karl leaving and because I care for her. We have done enough, let her family carry the burden now. We have to look after ourselves.”

“We should at least tell her about the divorce and then see how she feels,” offered Benedikt as a compromise. “If she wants to leave on her own accord
then that would be fine. I will not throw them out.”

“If she doesn't leave on her own account then we can at least suggest it to he
r. Gently shoo her on the way,” Johanna argued. “She wouldn't want to be a burden, I am sure. She probably doesn't even fully grasp the situation. She is always so optimistic and naïve.”

“She only leaves if she wants to,” he repeated. “You will not suggest it to her, do you understand? There is something like family honour.”

“If I didn't know any better I would start worrying that you have a crush on that woman,” Johanna said and turned away angrily.

That evening Benedikt and Johanna ordered their daughter Roswitha to stay with Ernst while they sat down with Greta in the kitchen and broke the news of the divorce to her.

“Oh I feel so stupid!” Greta said, almost amused. “I should have known, I should have guessed. Of course he went to Berlin to divorce me. That is why he did not want to go to Poland. How could I have thought anything else? I can't believe I really imagined that a German would flee with his Jewish wife to Poland. To think he had it all planned and lied to me. I can't say I deserve any better for my naivety.”

“Don't
say that,” Johanna comforted. “He spoke to me about going to Berlin and he never said once he was going to divorce you. They must have forced him to do that when he got there. You know about the laws about mixed marriages, it might have even been a deal to save Karl? He had no intention to abandon you when he told me about his plans. He must have changed his mind,” Johanna said.

“Greta
, my love, it is better this way,” Benedikt added. “You are better off without him. It is easier to be on one side of the fence than sat on it. Now you can be with your people and don't have to worry about your loyalties. As a Jewish family you can stick together and solve your problems together. It makes your life much less complicated.”

“Oh
! I see. Well in that case it will probably best if I pack my things and go back to stay with my father. Now that we are no longer family in the legal sense it would be unfair of me to compromise your situation. You have been kind enough as it is. Thank you for everything that you did,” Greta replied.

“I wish things were different,” Johanna said
, acting so compassionately that she almost believed it herself. “You have been a great help, but we are busier on the farm now that it is expanding and there will be more visitors coming. It wouldn't be easy to have you here.  We will pack you some food that you can bring to your family,” Johanna assured her.

“I will send Gunter to tell your family that
you'll be coming. I am so sorry things did not work out,” Benedikt concluded the conversation.

Greta did not shed a tear for her
marriage. The thrill of her first infatuation and the excitement of the early years had long gone. The harsh reality of farm life and motherhood had eroded the romantic notion of the happily-ever-after couple that she had envisaged that they would become. Their mutual interest of reading books had been buried under dirty laundry and his ever growing work commitments. They had not even talked to each other late at night in bed as they initially did, at least not about anything that mattered. When had their love become such a routine and joyless affair? At times she had been closer to Johanna than she had been to her own husband. He must have felt the same way and decided the best course of action was to leave. She did not blame him. If he had stopped loving her it was not his fault. Their union had only ever made sense because of their love. Take that irrational attraction away and it was suddenly a very inconvenient and very dangerous enterprise. To end it was the sensible thing to do. Were things different, it might be worth fighting for their marriage but under these loveless circumstances, had roles been reversed, she might have done the same.

Her grief about
Karl was of course quite different; here she could not rationalize her feelings away. She missed that boy. No one could imagine what it was like to lose your own child until it happened to them. She wanted to cry but she was not just a woman any more, she was a mother and her emotional state had to be in top shape for her son Ernst. She could not let him see her sadness and her devastation. She would get over this and be strong for him; he was all she had now.

Two days later J
onah picked up Greta and Ernst. They moved back home and shared Wilma’s room, who was full of joy to have her sister back. Of course the Weissensteiners were outraged that Greta and Ernst had been abandoned and that Karl had been taken away in such a sneaky manner, but at least they had their beloved Greta back with them.

T
here was simply nothing they could do to get Karl back. Wilhelm held all the trumps. The law, the politics and all circumstances made it impossible to even try. It was better to get on with their lives and be as quiet as possible. Over time they came to believe that Karl was probably safer in the hands of his German father anyway, even though Greta did worry how he could ever live safely in Germany as the child of a mixed marriage. She hoped that Wilhelm knew what he was doing.

That year saw the
first wave of food shortages that would last well into the following year, mainly caused by the demands for food from Germany that had been agreed and guaranteed in a Treaty of Protection between Germany and Slovakia. However, a positive result was that the economy improved. Workers had been offered opportunities in the Reich and instead of unemployment there suddenly was a shortage of labour in Bratislava. Railways networks were extended and improved all over the country, new roads were built and the electricity network was also expanded, often thanks to the forced labour from the camps. To the general population this was of course all good news. War activity was far away from Slovakian soil and with the improvements in the infrastructure, one could easily be persuaded to think that the independent state had chosen wisely in becoming a close ally of Germany.

Even though the situation for the Jews was uncomfortable, it remained stable and less harsh than in Germany itself. Rumours spread about the dreadful condition
s in the work camps erect in Poland and the deportation of many Jews from Western Europe into them. In Slovakia, the work camps were still mainly filled by criminals and political enemies of the state. Mass deportations of Jews without such backgrounds had not taken place and the development of ghettos was not as strictly enforced as in other areas of Hitler's influence.

In honour of its late founder
, the ruling Slovak People's Party renamed itself into the Hlinka Party. Some of the Hlinka Guard, the military organisation of the party who was now properly organised and officially recognised, started to take to the streets to beat up and terrorize Jews. Nobody had to wear the Star of David yet and so occasionally gentiles were beaten up by mistake.

Greta and Wilma rarely left the house, mainly because of the Hlinka Guard, which
had brought terror back to Wilma, but also because they were needed at the workshop. The Slovak girls who had been helping out at the workshop had found employment elsewhere that they said was better paid and less boring, and so the burden fell on Alma, their only employee now, and Jonah’s children. Jonah was determined not to let the Countess, his great benefactor, down and worked as hard as he could.

Wilma raised the question o
f whether their employees had left because they knew the Weissensteiners were Jewish but Greta dismissed the idea as farfetched. Jonah said if their names had been on a hit list there would have been trouble already. During the autumn several laws and decrees were passed who ordered the transfer of all Jewish property into Christian ownership and Jewish bank accounts were frozen, but nobody had approached the Weissensteiner family.

They had survived
for almost twenty years in Bratislava without unwanted attention, if they could survive this newest wave of discrimination without being detected it was not likely to occur after this. Just because two girls found a better job at a time when labour was short that did not mean an unprecedented anti-Semitic attack was imminent. However, secretly he did worry a little.

Alma had guessed their secret before she even got to the
Weissensteiners. She had known some Weissensteiners in Budapest and she had not the slightest problem with Jews, as long as they were not too fanatic. The ones with beards and curls scared her a little although she could not say why. None of them had ever even as much as given her a dirty look. She appreciated the gentle nature of Jonah and admittedly had developed a little crush on this lovely and kind man. Wilma liked Alma a lot, but with all her hysteria and paranoia she was not sure if she could trust her yet.

Johanna and Benedikt were enjoying their new existence as big fish in a small pond and became rather dictatorial with their staff. With Greta gone they felt no longer compromised in using their power and
enjoyed inflicting their will on a whim. For years they had been a minority in the country and had to compete with the locals to sell their goods, now there was no competition as everything that was produced found buyers and Germans were much more accepted in society than ever before, although of course a slight reservation naturally remained.

To her own
big surprise Johanna did feel a hint of guilt about making Greta and Ernst leave. She knew it had been an extreme precaution and every so often she wondered if she had done the right thing. Having gone so obsessively to church every Sunday she must have picked up the odd Christian doctrine without meaning to. When possible, she sneaked some food in a basket when she went to market in town and delivered it to the Weissensteiners. She knew it was risky and probably stupid after she had worked so hard to erase the connection with the Jewish weavers, but while her fear to miss out on the new opportunities in the new Slovakia had dominated her decisions before, occasionally now she was overcome by surprisingly affectionate feelings for Greta and Ernst. She reasoned with herself that in Bratislava she may not even be recognised and never stayed with them for long anyway. A few cuddles with Ernst and she was on her way again. Benedikt would be furious if he knew that she was feeding them after throwing them off the farm. He probably would have rightfully argued that this was much more dangerous and public than sheltering a secretly Jewish woman on their farm, but she could not help herself. She could have sent one of her girls to do it for her, but did not trust them enough with such a secret task.