QB VII (50 page)

Abe turned and started for the door.

“Daddy!” Vanessa cried and clung to him.

“Let me go alone, Vinny,” he said.

He reached the street and stopped to catch his breath. “Abe! Abe!” Lady Sarah called, catching up to him. “I’ll get my car,” she said.

“I don’t want a goddam Bentley. I want a goddam Austin taxi.”

“Abe, please let me be with you.”

“Madame, I am en route to Soho where my intentions are to get shit-faced drunk and sleep with a whore.”

“I’ll be your whore!” she cried, grabbing him. “I’ll scratch and scream and bite and curse and you’ll drool on me and hit me and cry ... and then I’ll hold you.”

“Oh Jesus, God,” he groaned, clinging to her, “I’m scared. I’m scared.”

33

T
HERE WAS A CRUEL
expression in Adam Kelno’s face as he glared from the plaintiff’s table to Abraham Cady. Their eyes met Adam Kelno smiled slightly.

“Silence!”

Mr. Justice Gilray seated himself. “We are all shocked and distressed over the untimely passing of Dr. Tesslar, but I’m afraid nothing can be done about that. What are your intentions, Mr. Bannister, about placing his statement into evidence?”

“That won’t be necessary,” Bannister answered.

Gilray blinked in disbelief. Highsmith, anticipating a long, involved hassle, was taken aback.

Shimshon Aroni slipped next to Abe and passed him a note,
I AM ARONI
, it read;
WE HAVE SOBOTNIK
.

“Where do things stand now, Mr. Bannister?” the judge asked.

“I have one more witness to call.”

The smile left Adam Kelno’s face and his heart raced.

“There are some rather unusual circumstances surrounding this witness, my Lord, and I should like to seek his Lordship’s advice on the matter. This witness held an important position in a Communist country and only last night defected with his family. He arrived in London at two in the morning and has asked for and been granted political asylum. We have been searching for over a year for this gentleman but had no idea if he were alive or if he would come forward until he showed up in London.”

“Is his entry into this trial on a completely voluntary basis?”

“I have no idea what induced him to defect, my Lord.”

“What is our problem? If the witness has volunteered there is no question of issuing a subpoena. If he is here against his will, it would be a muddled bit of business because we don’t know if he is in the jurisdiction of the British courts even though he has claimed asylum.”

“No, my Lord. The problem is that usually when a defector asks asylum he is taken into seclusion for a long period of time until his rehabilitation. We cannot rule out the possibility of foul play against this witness and therefore he was accompanied to the Law Court by several gentlemen from Scotland Yard.”

“I see. Are they armed?”

“Yes, my Lord. Both the Foreign Office and Scotland Yard share the opinion they should be handy at all times. We are obliged to protect him.”

“It is indeed distressing to think that any foul play could take place in an English courtroom. I don’t like closed courts. We practice our law in the open. Are you asking that this witness be heard In Camera?”

“No, my Lord. The fact that we have discussed this matter and everyone knows there are Scotland Yard men present, that in itself should discourage anyone who intended foul play.”

“Well, I don’t like armed men in my court, but I’m not going to clear it. I shall yield to the unusual circumstances. Call your witness, Mr. Bannister.”

“He will testify in Czech, your Lordship.”

Adam Kelno strained for remembrance for the name Gustuv Tukla. The standing crowd in the rear of the room was separated by a pair of detectives. Between them walked a haggard, frightened man. Outside the courtroom, Scotland Yard detectives sealed off every exit. As the veil of time lifted Adam Kelno gasped and scribbled a desperate note to Smiddy.
STOP HIM
.

“Impossible,” Smiddy whispered. “Get hold of yourself.”

Smiddy passed a note up to Sir Robert,
KELNO IS EXTREMELY DISTRESSED.

Gustuv Tukla’s hand trembled as he was affirmed and he took a seat. He looked about in animal desperation as the translator was sworn in.

“Before we continue,” Mr. Justice Gilray said, “it is apparent that this witness is under a great deal of strain. I will tolerate no harassment of this man. Mr. Interpreter, kindly inform Mr. Tukla he is in England, in Her Majesty’s Court, and he will receive no maltreatment. Advise him to be certain he understands every question clearly before he answers.”

Tukla managed a small smile and nodded to the judge. He gave his last address in Brno and his birthplace as Bratislava, where he lived until the war broke out and worked as a civil engineer.

“What was your most recent position?”

“I am one of the directors and production managers of the Lenin Factories, a large factory of many thousand workers in heavy industrial manufacturing.”

Mr. Justice Gilray, in an effort to put the witness at ease, discussed with him a number of articles he had read on the Brno Trade Fair and the Czech reputation in this field.

“Were you, at the time of your defection, an official of the Communist Party?” Bannister began.

“I was District Chairman of the Industrial Committee and a member of the National Committee in the same group.”

“That is a rather important post, is it not?”

“Yes.”

“Were you a member of the Communist Party at the outbreak of the war?”

“No. I officially joined the party in 1948, when I went to work in Brno as an engineer.”

“Have you changed your name, sir?”

“Yes.”

“Would you tell us about the circumstances?”

“At the time of the war my name was Egon Sobotnik. I am half-Jewish on my father’s side. After liberation I changed my name because I was afraid to be found out.”

“About what?”

“Some things I was made to do in Jadwiga Concentration Camp.”

“Tell us now, if you will, about being sent to Jadwiga Concentration Camp.”

“I fled to Budapest when the Germans occupied Bratislava and lived with false papers. I was picked up by the Hungarian police and returned to Bratislava and sent by the Gestapo to Jadwiga, where I was assigned to the medical compound. This was late in 1942.”

“Who did you report to?”

“Dr. Adam Kelno.”

“Is he in this courtroom?”‘

Sobotnik pointed a shaky finger. The judge repeated that the shorthand writer could not transcribe a gesture. “That is him.”

“What kind of work were you given to do?”

“Clerical. Keeping records, mostly. Finally I kept the clinical and surgical record books.”

“Were you, at some time, contacted by the underground? By the underground, I refer to the international underground. Do you understand my question?”

“May I have leave, your Lordship,” the interpreter said, “to explain this to Mr. Tukla?”

“Yes, go on.”

They conversed and Tukla nodded and answered. “Mr. Tukla understands. He says there was a small underground group of Polish officers and a larger one that encompassed everyone. He was contacted in the summer of 1943 and told that there was great concern about the medical experiments. At night he and a Dutch Jew, Menno Donker, copied from the surgical records what operations had taken place in Barrack V and turned it over to a contact.”

“What did your contact do?”

“I don’t know but the plan was to smuggle this information to the outside.”

“Risky business.”

“Yes, Menno Donker was discovered.”

“Do you know what happened to Donker?”

“He was castrated.”

“I see. Did it not occur to you as strange that the Germans wanted records kept of this sort of thing?”

“The Germans have a mania for records. At first I am sure they thought they were going to win the war. Later, they felt by taking records and then falsifying them they could justify a great number of deaths.”

“How long did you keep the surgical record?”

“I started in 1942 and kept it until the liberation in 1945. There were six volumes.”

“Now, going back, sir. You said you changed your name and apparently your identity after the war because of things you were forced to do in Jadwiga. Would you tell us about that?”

“At first I only did clerical work. Then, Kelno found out I was a member of the underground. Fortunately, he did not know I was smuggling out records of his operations. I was terrified he would turn me over to the SS. He forced me to do a number of things to help him.”

“Like what?”

“Hold patients still while they were being given spinals. At times I was made to give the spinals.”

“Were you trained at this?”

“I was shown once for a few minutes.”

“What else were you forced to do?”

“Also restrain patients who were having sperm tests.”

“You mean, shoving a wooden handle up their rectums to induce sperm?”

“Yes.”

“Who did that?”

“Dr. Kelno and Dr. Lotaki.”

“How many times did you see Dr. Kelno do that?”

“At least forty or fifty separate occasions. There could be any number of men worked on each time.”

“Were they in pain?”

Tukla lowered his eyes. “Very much so.”

“And this was done to healthy men prior to being irradiated and then operated on as the beginning of the experiment.”

“My Lord,” Highsmith said. “Mr. Bannister is leading the witness and asking conclusions of him.”

“I’ll put it another way.” Bannister said. “Was Dr. Adam Kelno collaborating with the Germans in medical experiments?”

“Yes.”

“And how do you know that?”

“I saw him.”

“Did you see him operate in Barrack V?”

“Yes.”

“Many times?”

“I saw him perform two or three hundred operations in Barrack V, anyhow.”

“On Jews?”

“Once in a while a court order case but ninety-nine percent Jews.”

“Did you observe Dr. Kelno in surgery in his regular clinic, in Barrack XX?”

“Yes, on many occasions. Many dozens of times.”

“And you saw him hold clinic. Perform the minor bits of business such as boils and cuts.”

“Yes.”

“Did you observe any significant difference between Dr. Kelno’s behavior in Barrack V from his behavior in his regular clinic?”

“Yes, he was brutal to the Jews. He often beat them or cursed them.”

“On the operating table?”

“Yes.”

“Now, Mr. Tukla. I am going to refer to a particular series of operations performed in the early part of November of 1943. There were eight men who had testicles removed and three sets of twins who had ovariectomies.”

“I remember it quite clearly. It was November 10. It was the night Menno Donker was castrated.”

“Tell us about it please.”

He drank some water, spilling it with trembling. His face became devoid of color. “I was told to report to Barrack V. There was a small army of Kapos and SS. Around seven o’clock the fourteen victims were brought to the anteroom and we were told to shave them and give them spinals.”

“In the anteroom, not in the operating room.”

“Always in the anteroom. Dr. Kelno didn’t want to waste time in the surgery.”

“Had these people been given a previous injection?”

“No. Dr. Viskova and Dr. Tesslar complained on several occasions that it was only humane to give them morphia.”

“What did Dr. Kelno say to that?”

“He said, ‘We don’t waste morphia on pigs.’ On other occasions it was suggested it would be better to put the people under, put them to sleep as he did in Barrack XX. Dr. Kelno said he didn’t have time to waste.”

“So injections were always given in the anteroom without morphia and by unskilled or semiskilled people.”

“That is correct.”

“Were these people in pain?”

“Severe pain. That is my guilt ... that is my guilt ...” He rocked back and forth biting his lip to stave off the tears.

“Are you quite able to continue, Mr. Tukla?”

“I must continue. I have held this in for over twenty years. I must finish with it so I can have peace.” And he sobbed, “I was a coward. I should have refused like Donker.” He heaved a number of deep sighs and apologized and nodded that he wished to continue.

“Now, sir, you were present in the anteroom of Barrack V on the night of November 10 and you assisted in the preparation of these fourteen people. Please continue.”

“Menno Donker was first. Kelno told me to come into the surgery and keep him quiet.”

“Did you sterilize yourself?”

“No.”

“Who else was present?”

“Dr. Lotaki assisted. There were one or two orderlies and two SS guards. Donker cried that he was healthy, then pleaded for Kelno to leave him one testicle.”

“What did Kelno answer to that?”

“He spit on him. In a moment or two there was such mayhem outside Voss ordered me to go to Barrack V to get Mark Tesslar. I returned with him to a scene so macabre I cannot forget it for a single day or a single night. Those young girls having the clothing torn from them, the screams of pain from the injection, the fighting and beating even on the operating table, the blood. Only Mark Tesslar was sane and human.”

“And you were present in the operating theater?”

“Yes, I moved all the victims in and out.”

“Who did the operations?”

“Adam Kelno.”

“All of them?”

“Yes.”

“Did he clean himself between operations?”

“No.”

“Did he sterilize his instruments?”

“No.”

“Was he considerate of his patients?”

“He was like a butcher turned loose with an ax in a slaughterhouse. It was a massacre.”

“How long did this go on?”

“He was doing it very fast, every ten or fifteen minutes. Around midnight I was told to take them back to Barrack III. There were stretchers, and they were on them side by side. The anteroom floor was gory with their blood. We carried them back to the barrack. Tesslar pleaded with me to get Kelno ... but I fled in horror.”

Adam Kelno wrote a note,
I AM LEAVING THE COURTROOM.