Vienna Prelude (54 page)

This morning, Roosevelt had read a transcript of Hitler’s speech. It was nothing to laugh about. A plea had come from British Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden, asking for an indication from the United States that the great democracy behind the Atlantic Wall might aid in finding some solution. Throughout the day, Roosevelt had read and reread Eden’s secret dispatch. He had pored over the articles and assessed public opinion once again. There were only a few men brave enough to say what they knew to be true. Everyone else hoped that if they hid their heads, the storm would pass quickly by.

Roosevelt frowned. He knew better. Hitler was hungry. More hungry than the millions who lined up right now in soup kitchens across America. Men would steal and kill and lie when they were hungry. Maybe not all, but some. And there were a few among them who would do all those things even when they were satisfied.

He wheeled himself back around to his desk and picked up the telephone. “Ring British Ambassador Lindsay for me, Sec’try Welles!” he drawled. Then he hung up and began to write his reply to Anthony Eden:

***

President Roosevelt’s message was passed on to Sir Ronald Lindsay with the warning that it must be treated as top secret until the British communicated their opinion on the possibility of such a conference. After all, a president with a Congress so rooted in neutrality dared not openly involve himself in an attempt to stop Europe’s quarrels.

Within hours the letter was placed inside a diplomatic pouch bound for England. But this thin thread of hope could not have reached London at a worse time. Anthony Eden, who would have understood the significance of Roosevelt’s offer, was still in France. The envelope, marked
Top Secret
, was instead placed on the desk of British Prime Minister Chamberlain.

It was discussed politely over tea with the PM’s chief advisor, Sir Horace Wilson, and undersecretary of state for foreign affairs, Sir Alexander Cadogan.

“Eden, of course”—Wilson was disdainful—“would accept the President’s invitation joyfully, I have no doubt.”

“Well, he’s off on the Riviera with Winston now, isn’t he?” added Chamberlain. “I think it’s best if we say nothing to Eden about the matter, don’t you agree?” He leveled his gaze on Cadogan, who had already, in fact, attempted to reach Eden by phone and then had dispatched the message by special courier, who had missed Eden’s train in Marseilles by five minutes.

Cadogan did not attempt to conceal his disapproval. “I think it most unwise to make the decision without at least consulting the foreign secretary! The message is addressed to Eden.”

“Such a conference is impossible,” Chamberlain explained like a schoolmaster instructing a stupid pupil. “It will only interfere with our own plans. You see, we plan to work for a reestablishment of friendship with Fascist Italy. Their conflict in Spain is . . . well, it really has nothing to do with England, has it? And Anthony Eden has been so disapproving . . . the Italians don’t like Anthony, I’m afraid.”

Cadogan sat in stunned disbelief. Chamberlain was personally making his own foreign policy without consulting either the vabinet or the foreign minister! “But what about the president of the United States? This is the first indication that the United States might even put a toe in the water. Are we going to turn him down?”

Chamberlain shrugged. “We don’t need them.” He was smiling benignly. “The Germans are people. The Italians are people. Why, my brother Austen and Mussolini’s brother were great chums in the twenties! Practically family. We can reason this out. We are practical men.”

Cadogan sat glumly silent for a moment. At last he spoke. “Yes. And in the last war, the German kaiser and the king of England were cousins as well. Didn’t stop ten million deaths in the trenches though, did it?”

Chamberlain’s patience fled. He sniffed and raised his chin in indignation at Cadogan’s remark. “Quite enough. Cable the president!” he snapped. “Tell Roosevelt that we cannot accept his offer because we have much more fruitful prospects of our own.” He sipped his tea again. “And really, Cadogan, Eden need not hear of this. No need at all. It will simply upset him; don’t you agree, Horace?”

Sir Horace, who had been enjoying a biscuit, nodded. “One can’t expect to take such a message seriously. What good would it do for us to sit around and chat about Germany and Italy? Wooly nonsense, you know, just wooly nonsense!”

“You have your orders, Cadogan. Send the wire, will you?” Chamberlain looked down his nose at Cadogan—a defense against the anger and disapproval that must have been evident on the undersecretary’s face as he stalked out of the room.

***

New inmates crowded into Dachau faster than the bodies of the dead could be carried away. Every day brought frightened, bewildered men into the roll call. Neat lines of living dead were taught, by the sting of a lash, to stand for hours on end in the freezing cold; to eat thin watery soup made from a few rotten vegetables; to suffer without argument at the hands of the master Aryans chosen as their keepers.

Theo envied the priest and the cantor now. Daily rations grew shorter, and the cruelty of the guards toward men too sick to work became more intense. At night the moans of the dying created a scene from Dante’s
Inferno
. Each morning, those who were dead and those who were dying were taken out of the barracks.

This morning a pale dawn broke over the distant mountains. Perhaps a Bavarian farmer watched it out the window as he ate his breakfast, Theo thought. Such shimmering pastels would be beautiful if a man could simply sit and watch the colors change. But in the lines, brutal guards with jackboots and whips were beating those who had trouble standing. Kicks and screams drowned out the sound of the birds. Blood was brighter than the sky. Theo stared straight ahead and thought how lucky were the men who had died.

Two guards shoved an old man into line next to Theo. The shining new prisoner identification band read
J. Stern
. The guard shoved the butt of his whip under Theo’s chin. “A new prisoner,” he growled to Theo. “Another Stern. Two Sterns we have in this line now. Are you dogs born of the same litter?”

Theo did not reply.

The guard continued. “You will teach this old man the rules, Stern,” he warned Theo. “If he breaks them,
you
will be punished!” With a hard blow to the side of Theo’s face, the guard walked on.

Theo did not raise his hand to touch the trickle of blood that flowed down his cheek. He did not acknowledge his pain.

“Your name is Stern, also?” asked the old man. “I am Julius Stern.”

“Shut up!” Theo hissed. The first rule must be silence on the line! The old man understood and obeyed instantly. Out of the corner of his eye, Theo could see that the hands of Julius Stern were soft and plump. His chin was pink where the SS had shaved off his goatee. Weak eyes squinted into the harsh morning light. He was short, at least a head shorter than Theo—and he filled out the striped prisoner’s uniform.
It is good that he has extra weight,
Theo thought.
Soon enough he will burn away every extra ounce on his body.
Theo pitied his new charge. The soft hands trembled with confusion and fear at what had befallen him.

Throughout the long, cold hours of that first day, the old man worked in front of Theo. The rocks cut his hands as he labored with the other men to build an embankment for a road. He tried to sit, gasping for air.

“Don’t sit,” Theo whispered through clenched teeth. “I will pass the stones around you. Only don’t sit. They will shoot us.”

The old man put a hand to his heart and wheezed words that Theo could not understand. Theo knew that his new companion would not survive long if the guards drove him as ruthlessly as they did the younger men. But then, that was the idea, after all. It was the policy. Those who could work for the sake of the Reich deserved to live.

That night the old man lay on the hard wooden pallet of the Herrgottseck where the priest had died. He clutched his chest and breathed with difficulty as he tried to talk to Theo. “They have broken my eyeglasses,” he moaned. “I cannot see my own hand.”

“Stay by me.” Theo’s voice was urgent. “You must do what I do or they will beat us both, Herr Stern.”

“Why have they done this?” The old man began to weep softly. “I am not even a German. I am Austrian, from Vienna!” His voice was pleading, but there was no one there who could help him.

“An Austrian!” a voice called from another pallet. “There are this week a hundred Austrians here. New men. Since Schuschnigg arrested those Nazis in Vienna.”

“But I have committed no crime!” the old man protested. “I am a professor of literature at the university! Not a German! My colleagues tried to convince me to fly back from Brussels, but I was afraid! I was terrified of the airplane, you see, and so I took the train and—” He shook his head in confusion. “I had a copy of the book by Kafka—
The Trial.
How was I to know that the Germans arrested men for having such a book? I could have sent that back on the plane, but I brought it to read—just to read on the trip across Germany, and they arrested me! I have been days in a prison in Munich! They cut off my beard and took my glasses, and now I am here without knowing how. Or why! Like the man in
The Trial!
Imprisoned and condemned and executed without ever knowing why.”

Theo let him run down; then he leaned over him. “You must not say more about your arrest, Professor Stern,” he whispered. “There are informers even here. In this place we are like the man in Kafka’s book. That is why the book is forbidden.” He put his hand gently on the old man’s arm. “You must stay with me, Professor. Are you hungry?”

The old man turned his head away miserably. “Too tired to eat.”

“If you don’t eat you will die.” Theo helped him up. “There is a rule that you must come to get your own ration. Five ounces of bread a day. Eat half tonight. Save the rest for morning.” He spoke to Stern as if he were a small child. “Come, Professor, I will help you.”

The old man squinted at Theo. “Have I stepped into Kafka’s book, Jacob? Have I lost my mind and lost my way and now am condemned to live out the fate of a character in a book?”

Theo could see the cataracts on the old scholar’s eyes. He was almost blind, yet they had taken his glasses, his books, and his life from him. Theo tried to think what would bring the old man to some reality other than this present horror. “So you are a professor of literature?” he asked. “I met my wife in Vienna.” He would not mention Elisa, but the thought of her music and the symphony made him eager to ask a thousand questions of the old man. “Do you go to the symphony? to the Musikverein?”

“Yes. I always have season tickets.” His voice sounded choked. That world seemed so far away now.

“You will be back in no time,” Theo tried to comfort him. “A small infraction. You will be released.” He chose to ignore the mocking laughter of those who overheard his comment. “Tell me, please. What did the orchestra play this year at the Musikverein? Can you remember the programs? the music? and the musicians? Do you . . . can you describe it all to me? It has been so very long since I have heard music. Violins. Please, Professor Stern, tell me about Vienna? How was it when you saw it last?” Somehow Theo’s simple, eager questions returned dignity and composure to the old man. He sighed, and as thin green water was poured into filth-encrusted bowls, he began to speak about Vienna as it had been. Theo was suddenly relieved that the professor was nearly blind. The old man could not see what he was eating. Perhaps his sense of taste was not so keen anymore either. He only grimaced slightly as he sipped the stinking brew and talked about the music and the city to Theo and the others who joined them in the Herrgottseck. For a time, the professor was lecturing again to a captive audience. For an hour his role was a comfort to inmates and to himself.

They had almost forgotten the world outside these walls, and tonight it came back to them.

“The first program at the Musikverein last year was
Elijah
! Oh the
power
of it! The chorus was superb!”

“And the strings?” Theo asked, picturing Elisa by the light of her music stand. “The violins, Herr Professor?”

“The violins? Ah, what can one say about the violins of the Vienna Philharmonic, Jacob? They are the finest,
ja
? The finest in the world.”

37

A Hell More Fierce Than Dachau

Murphy sat in the highest balcony of the Vienna State Opera House, where the night’s performance was about to be played. He was sure that Elisa would not see him from this distance—if indeed she was still with the orchestra and hadn’t disappeared with her long-lost love.

He was angry at himself for coming tonight. It seemed to be a particularly cruel form of self-torture to sit in the farthest gallery and stare at the empty chair in the first violin section and wonder if she would appear.
Hope
she would appear; then hope again that she was somewhere else, far away from Vienna. The guys in the press room had talked about men who had gone nuts over some dame—like King Edward, giving up his crown. Now here he was sitting in an auditorium, like a Peeping Tom climbing a tree to look in a window at a girl. He couldn’t remember ever before having the feeling that he was looking into someone’s
heart.
But that was the way Elisa had made him feel.