The Sisters of Auschwitz Page 6

  In the autumn of 1941, Eberhard goes to see Rhijn. It is of vital importance he is declared unfit. Rhijn comes straight to the point.

  ‘How much do you weigh now?’

  ‘Ten and a half stone, more or less, at five foot nine.’

  ‘That will be a starvation cure then. I want you to drop to seven stone nine, eight stone two at most, so you will cut such a sorry figure that no one wants you any more. Now, we just have to think up a disease for you.’

  ‘I remember my older brother had a kidney problem, so he failed his Wehrmacht medical examination at the time.’

  ‘All right,’ says Rhijn, ‘I’ll give you a rhubarb medicine ten days before the examination, so your urine will show you had an early kidney infection. I have to warn you: it’s disgusting stuff – but you’ll survive.’

  Eberhard instantly agrees on the plan and Rhijn prescribes a strict diet; he tells Eberhard how to transform from a fit, handsome young man into a pathetic bag of bones in the shortest possible time.

  ‘What you’ll do is this: you work till three in the morning, then you drink several cups of strong coffee, sleep for one or two hours, no more, then you get on your bicycle and peddle through the city as fast as you can for five or, better yet, ten miles. You come see me twice a week for a check-up. From now on you are my patient.’

  Eberhard starts training immediately. The early rising is hardest; at five in the morning, when the house is still quiet, he drags his hungry body outside to cycle through The Hague. His stomach rumbling, his legs soft as chewing gum, he races across the cobbles like a competitive cyclist then returns to Lien and Kathinka, still warm in bed, at dawn. He is exhausted and sweaty, he sees stars and almost collapses, but he keeps focusing on his goal: not to be sent to the Wehrmacht, away from his wife and newly born daughter.

  As Eberhard rapidly loses weight, reports trickle in of Hitler’s offensive in the Soviet Union. There, German troops have started the largest military action in history: Operation Barbarossa. Hitler’s ultimate goal lies in the east, where there is enough Lebensraum to realize his plans for the German people. In Mein Kampf, he had already voiced his contempt for the Slavic people, the Untermenschen, and their reprehensible ideology, Communism.

  On 22 June 1941, without prior declaration of war, the Wehrmacht had invaded the Soviet Union with four million men, 600,000 horses and 2,000 aircraft. Eberhard, and therefore Lientje, had been optimistic from the first day of the Dutch occupation onwards; this war would not last long. But with the opening of the Eastern Front and reports that the Blitzkrieg had taken the Soviets by surprise, the first cracks in their positive outlook begin to show.

  A few weeks later, on a dismal autumn day, a shadow of the former Eberhard reports at the committee in The Hague. A vast space has formed between his upper legs, his skin is painfully tight around his bones and he permanently seems to suck in his cheeks. Yellowish bags underneath his eyes and a glistening layer of sweat on his forehead make him look sickly. A line of well-fed men in tight uniforms eyes him disapprovingly as he strips down to his underpants. Eberhard is measured and weighed.

  ‘Eight stone!’ a voice shouts.

  ‘Not much, something wrong with you, or what?’ another says.

  ‘Yes, I’m short-sighted,’ Eberhard answers.

  ‘Irrelevant!’

  ‘I have bandy legs and can’t walk very far.’

  ‘No infantry then, but we need people at the anti-aircraft guns too.’

  Eberhard begins to doubt. He has been feeling wretched for days but drew courage from the shocked responses of his housemates to his appearance. He had hoped this plan would succeed if only he would persist. As the men look on unaffectedly, it starts to dawn on him that anything with a beating heart passes; they simply need cannon fodder.

  ‘I’ve had three serious ear infections as a child, so—’ Eberhard tries.

  ‘You’re a musician, so nothing wrong with your hearing, right?’

  ‘And I’ve had severe kidney infections at least twice.’ His protests sound weaker; he understands all his efforts have been in vain.

  ‘Beding kriegsverwendungsfähig! Conditionally fit for war!’ a uniform growls at the man filling in the forms.

  ‘We shall be in touch.’

  They turn away from him; the examination is over. The men before and after him are declared fit and called up on the spot. Eberhard has been tossed a sliver of hope: conditionally ‘fit for war’. His fate hangs by a thread. They shall have to wait again.

  The following weeks, Eberhard eats anything Lien serves him to gain some weight. While he checks the letterbox at least ten times a day, they discuss the possible scenarios for when the call arrives. Should he put on the hateful uniform and fight for the enemy, hoping one day he will return to Lien and Kathinka alive? Or shall he go underground, like so many people they have helped? Perhaps they could all have seen this coming, but it is still a tough decision to make: if Eberhard is conscripted, he shall go into hiding.

  On 6 December 1941, the letter arrives that will officially make Eberhard a deserter. Public enemy number one. Hitler has always been clear about treason or fahnenflucht: at the front one might die, as a deserter one must. He has to report on 15 January 1942 at a regiment in Wolfenbüttel in Germany, where he has been assigned to the NSDAP for office work. A one-way train ticket has been enclosed. He holds it in his hand, knowing he will not go, certainly after the latest reports about the Eastern Front.

  Through the resistance he has heard about the Blitzkrieg: the blazing stroke of lightning that would force the Soviets to their knees has morphed into a slow, ice-cold funeral march. After a series of German triumphs in the first months, the war machine is faltering. The infantry cannot keep up with the armoured divisions, supplies lag behind and Hitler’s strategic decisions are beyond comprehension. Millions of men rush forwards across steppes and tundra, and the merciless Russian winter is yet to come.

  On the day when Eberhard receives his call, 29 degrees below zero are measured in Moscow. In the first phase of Operation Barbarossa, the Soviets lost almost 800,000 men, but in early December, they strike back viciously. German soldiers lose limbs, eyelids, hair, noses and ears to the frost – but are forced to carry on. The zombie army marches further, leaving a trail of scarecrows behind on the Russian steppe. Some Red Army soldiers, hit hard by the ‘blond monsters’ of the Nazi troops themselves, make a game out of putting up the dead in the snow; bodies are left in the most bizarre positions, like macabre sculptures in a war dance.

  The Soviet territory is vast and the Russian supply of soldiers makes Hitler’s men pale into insignificance; the Red Army is a living cushion and the Germans punch until they go numb. Stalin has six million men at his disposal and another fourteen million active reserves – cannon fodder slowly colouring the snow red.

  In January 1942, Janny has not seen Bob for six months – and he still has not met his daughter, Liselotte. He is still hiding with Haakon and Mieke Stotijn in Amsterdam and Janny misses him terribly.

  Her sister-in-law Aleid comes up with a plan so they can briefly spend some time together. She has married into a prominent family with a large network in the province of North Holland; her Jewish father-in-law, Jaap Hemelrijk, had been a headmaster in Alkmaar and councillor in Bergen until he was fired as a result of the German measures. Janny looks up to him and affectionately calls him ‘Grandpa Hemelrijk’. Despite his suffering owing to the oppressive regulations, he exudes a certain invincibility that inspires Janny with her own activities.

  Aleid and Jan Hemelrijk live in Bergen; she will ask her husband and her father-in-law if they, or someone else in the family, know of a holiday cottage in the neighbourhood, where Janny, Bob and the little ones can secretly spend a few days together. It works out differently.

  Janny learns from her sister that Eberhard is conscripted, after all, and she tries to comfort her. Lien is terrified the Germans will come and get Eberhard, or that he might be arrested as a deserter w
hen he refuses to report – they both know what that would mean. Janny has a plan but wants to run it by their dear friend Rhijn first. She thinks it would be wise for Eberhard to go to Bergen first; Janny will find another opportunity to see Bob – this is more important.

  Rhijn agrees with her, but time is running short; Eberhard has to report in Wolfenbüttel on 15 January and the freedom of movement in the Netherlands is increasingly restricted. Jews have not been allowed to move for quite some time now and the Germans are preparing a forced relocation, referred to with the strategic euphemism ‘evacuation’ – a word quickly adopted by the Dutch population and media. This ‘evacuation’ implies that Jews from all villages and cities in the Netherlands must leave home and hearth and move to Amsterdam – leaving all of their belongings behind. The plan is to concentrate everyone in one of the four Jewish areas: Transvaalbuurt, Rivierenbuurt, the Jewish Quarter and Asterdorp.

  Rhijn and Janny agree that she will contact Jan Hemelrijk and ask him for help, and that, for security reasons, they will not tell Lientje anything. Gestapo interrogation methods are notorious and what Lien doesn’t know, cannot be beaten out of her, either.

  And so it goes: Janny speaks to Jan and they decide it is safest for Eberhard to go into hiding at Jan and Aleid’s own place, at Karel de Grotelaan, Bergen. No one, except Janny and Rhijn, will know.

  Eberhard is preparing for his imminent departure, supposedly to report to the regiment in Wolfenbüttel; even his housemates are not allowed to know about the actual plans. He says goodbye to his piano students, packs his music books in a chest and gives them to Jolle in the adjoining room to look after. Finally, he writes to his parents saying they might not hear from him for a while but need not worry.

  After packing just the strictly necessary, Eberhard fills the rest of his suitcase with books; he hopes reading and studying will make the isolation and loneliness awaiting him less bleak.

  They celebrate New Year’s Eve together in Amsterdam, their spirits low, at the home of Father and Mother Brilleslijper and their little brother Jaap. Among each other they dare to voice their wishes for the year ahead. With a nod to a prayer, they hold hands around the table, allaying their fears with a curse and a spell. Father Brilleslijper leads: ‘We wish for the Soviet Union to gain important victories, and for England and America to decide to open a second front in Western Europe. Furthermore, we wish the Fascists a speedy downfall and Hitler personally dead.’ At that last sentence, Fietje raises an eyebrow, but she cannot deny feeling the same. ‘And finally, may we ourselves have enough strength to endure this war until the final victory, and may we fight our sadness with optimistic dreams for the future.’

  They raise their glasses and see in the New Year with a bittersweet toast.

  On 14 January 1942, Eberhard sticks his supposed new address in Wolfbüttel on the community board next to the telephone in the hall, clearly visible for everyone. He kisses Lien and his little Kathinka goodbye and takes the train to Amsterdam. At the exact same moment an anonymous young resistance worker crosses the Dutch border with Eberhard’s train ticket, as is arranged by Rhijn and Jan Hemelrijk, making it seem as if Eberhard did indeed travel to Wolfbuttel.

  In Amsterdam, Eberhard has his head shaven in the Jewish Quarter – who knows when he might get a decent haircut again – and late afternoon he arrives at a hostel for artists on the Prinsengracht, an address Rhijn had given him. Eberhard will stay the night there before travelling thirty miles north to Bergen the next morning. But whether it’s his freshly shaven head or the heavy suitcase, one way or another, the landlady suspects he is about to go into hiding and before Eberhard has made himself comfortable, she sends him back into the cold. Eberhard had seen his Jewish wife get snubbed more and more often, but he himself had always been treated with respect. From now on he is a pariah too.

  In the twilight, he walks down the Prinsengracht to Centraal Station, where he joins the busy commuter traffic as inconspicuously as he can. He travels to Alkmaar by train, gets on the steam tram to Bergen and, following the instructions Rhijn provided, walks to the house of Jan and Aleid Hemelrijk. Rhijn has also given him a forged identity card. The man in the photo is about the same age, also a pianist by profession, and his name has a Dutch ring to it. When Eberhard, enclosed by the dark but right on time for dinner, arrives at Jan and Aleid’s home in Bergen, he is Jean-Jacques Bos.

  8

  The Imprisonment

  Spring 1942. A watery sun reflects off the clinkers of Nieuwe Achtergracht in the centre of Amsterdam. When Jaap leaves his parental home in the morning, to walk to his bicycle parking operation, he is not aware he finds himself in the heart of the Jewish Quarter, at a moment in time when this is inadvisable.

  The occupation, the raids, the fact he and his friends are no longer welcome anywhere in the city – it’s all far away at this moment. The light is beautiful and the world, briefly, is how it used to be.

  At his one shoulder is the back of Carré Theatre, at the other the street where his bicycle parking is located. He loves Weesperstraat, with its bustle, all the shops, all the people and tram 8 tinkling in between. He knows everyone around here.

  Across the street from the delicatessen they used to own was the workshop of Uncle Meijer Waterman, the cigar maker. His family ran a cigar shop in the large premises on the corner, Weesperstraat 74. Jaap always enjoyed watching Meijer skilfully roll the cigars – a precise bit of work. Next to Waterman was a shop with second-hand goods and next to them was Werker, the coppersmith. His family shared the building with two other households: above them lived the Elzas family and down below the Korper family. Not only did old Grandmother Korper run a greengrocer’s shop in the basement, but two boys and a girl with beautiful reddish-brown curls, pale skin and freckles also lived in that flat. There must have been parents too. From the early morning, the basement stairs were filled with crates of vegetables and large potato bins, but they never saw any of the family members step over those crates to enter or leave the house.

  Across from Korper lived Cripple John, a man with one wooden leg who was nonetheless quick on his feet. He sold songs for a cent or less – but he sang them first and afterwards no one was willing to pay any more. And then there was the man on the cart, who Father always called ‘the spineless brickadier’. His wife pulled him, weak as a kitten, through the streets on a handcart, with him shouting at the top of his voice: ‘Unlucky bricklayer, broken spine! Worked from the age of twelve till twenty-six, fell off the roof and no one cared!’ A heartbreaking sight, even when you’d seen it a hundred times. His wife then passed the hat around and would shove her husband, handcart and all, into Hovingh’s pub. The tavern was on the corner of Weesperstraat, opposite Uncle Meijer Waterman – a beautiful place with a wooden façade. Late in the evening, neighbours would see the spineless brickadier go home, slurring, the swaying cart pushed by his drunken wife and chased by a handful of screaming children.

  As Jaap pulls the front door shut behind him and is about to cross the street to his bicycle parking, a local police officer walks towards him. He’s from the office on Jonas Daniël Meijerplein; Jaap has known him his entire life.

  Jaap wants to greet the officer, but the man looks straight ahead. In passing, he hisses something at Jaap.

  ‘They’ve got Henk. Get the hell out of here.’

  For a few seconds, Jaap freezes. Pinned to the cobbles, he tries to process what he has just heard. Henk is his partner. Together, they run the bicycle parking and coordinate all the underground contacts. Then he braces himself, buttons up his coat and heads in a straight line for the tram towards Centraal Station, where he takes the train to The Hague. A few hours later he knocks at Janny’s door on Bazarlaan. Without a word, she pulls him off the street and takes him upstairs.

  The next morning, they learn that the Germans, in reprisal for missing their catch, have dragged their sick and half-blind father out of his house and put him in a cell.

  They thought they had been so ca
utious with their ingenious network of contacts, code words, warning systems to protect themselves and their underground activities. But they had not seen this coming. Jaap and Janny, against their Brilleslijper nature, are at a loss. The thought of their father imprisoned is unbearable.

  But Janny quickly gathers herself and decides who in her network is the right person to handle this immediately. She contacts Benno Stokvis, a well-known Amsterdam lawyer. She knows he has good German contacts; Stokvis has his own ways and means and has successfully mediated for arrested Jews before.

  Janny implores him to do whatever it takes to get her father out of the cell as a matter of urgency. Stokvis succeeds, with money and sweet-talk, and after a few days the cell doors open for Joseph Brilleslijper, who cannot embrace Fietje tightly enough. Janny, in the meantime, has come to Amsterdam, too – Jaap stays behind in The Hague, with little Rob and Liselotte.

  In the privacy of the small home on Nieuwe Achtergracht, Janny thanks the lawyer for his services and discusses her concerns with him. The Germans were already after Bob. These past few weeks they have repeatedly called at Lien’s house asking where Eberhard has gone, and now they are chasing brother Jaap, as well; the noose is slowly tightening. It is a miracle the sisters themselves have not been caught yet.

  Stokvis shares his advice with her.

  ‘Get out of here. Take your parents, close the door behind you and don’t come back again. It’s going to get worse than you and I can imagine.’

  Janny does not doubt the gravity of his words for a second. Admitting no argument, she orders her mother to pack only the strictly necessary, grabs her father by the arm and takes them with her to The Hague, where Jaap and the little ones are waiting for them at home, on Bazarlaan.