Spark of Life (45 page)

He took another swig. “Would you like a cigarette first?” he asked suddenly.

Luebbe looked at him. “Yes,” he said.

Breuer stuck a cigarette between the man’s bleeding lips. “Here!” He lit Luebbe’s cigarette and with the same match also one for himself.

Both smoked in silence. Luebbe knew he was lost. He strained his ears in the direction of the window. Breuer emptied his glass. Then he put down his cigarette and seized the hammer. “Now, let’s get it over with.”

“Be damned for ever!” whispered Luebbe. The cigarette did not fall from his mouth; it stuck fast to his bleeding lower lip. Breuer struck several times with the blunt end of the hammer. It was a compliment to Luebbe, who slowly collapsed, that he didn’t use the pointed end.

For a while Breuer sat and brooded. Then he remembered what Luebbe had said. In a vague way he felt cheated. Luebbe had cheated him. He should have howled. But Luebbe would never have howled; not even if he had killed him slowly. He would have moaned; but that didn’t count, that was only the body. That was like a loud breathing, nothing more. Again Breuer heard the rumbling through the window. Someone would have to howl once more tonight, otherwise something would snap in him. That was it; now he knew it. It couldn’t just end like this, with Luebbe. In that case, Luebbe would have won. Clumsily he got up and walked
to Cell Four. He was lucky. A terrified voice began to scream, to beg, to wail, and only after a long time did it grow weaker and weaker and finally cease altogether.

Satisfied, Breuer returned to his room. “You see! You’re still in our power, after all!” he said to Luebbe’s corpse and kicked it with his foot. The kick wasn’t hard, but something in Luebbe’s face moved. Breuer bent over him; it seemed as though Luebbe were sticking out a gray tongue at him. Then he discovered that the cigarette had gone on burning down to the lips of the dead man; the kick had caused the little pillar of ash to collapse. Breuer was suddenly tired. He didn’t feel in the mood to drag out the corpse; so he kicked it under the bed with his feet. There’d be time enough tomorrow. A dark trail remained on the floor. Breuer grinned sleepily. And to think, when I was small, I couldn’t even look at blood, he thought. Too silly!

THE DEAD LAY PILED
up in heaps. The truck no longer came to fetch them. Raindrops hung silvery on their hair and lashes and hands. The rumbling on the horizon had ceased. The prisoners had seen the fire of the guns and heard the explosions until midnight, then everything had grown still.

The sun came up. The sky was blue and the breeze gentle and warm. On the highways outside the town nothing could be seen; not even refugees. The town lay there black and burned out. Through it the river wound its way like a vast glittering snake feeding itself on the corpse of the town. There were no troops anywhere.

For an hour during the night it had rained, a soft downpour, and a few puddles still remained. 509 squatted beside one and accidentally saw his face reflected in it. He leaned closer over the flat clear pool. He could not remember the last time he had seen himself in a mirror; it must have been many years ago. He had never seen one in the camp; and he didn’t recognize the face that now stared back at him.

His hair was white-gray stubble. Before coming to the camp it
had been thick and brown. He knew it had changed color, he had seen that when tufts of it had fallen to the ground during the hair-cutting; but loose hair on the floor seemed no longer to have any connection with oneself. In his face he recognized hardly anything; not even the eyes. What flickered there from two sockets above decayed teeth and the too-large nostrils was just something that distinguished him from the dead.

That is me? he thought.

He stared at himself again. He should have realized that he looked similar to the others around, but he had never seriously thought of it. Year after year he had seen them and noticed how they had changed; but since he had seen them every day the change had struck him less than now when seeing himself for the first time in years. It wasn’t that his hair was gray and patchy, his face nothing but a mockery of the full healthy face of his memory. What shocked him was that what he saw was an old man.

For a while he sat very quiet. He had thought a great deal during these last few days; but never of the fact that he was old. Twelve years of time was not very long. Twelve years of being locked up was more. But twelve years of concentration camp—who could tell how much that would mean later? Had he retained sufficient strength? Or would he, on getting out of it, break down like a tree rotting within which, in the calm, still seemed healthy, but which crumbled at the first storm? For this was what, in spite of everything, camp life had been—a calm; endless, terrifying, lonely, but nevertheless a calm. Hardly a sound from the outside world had penetrated to the inside. What would happen when the barbed wire fell?

509 stared once more into the shining pool. These are my eyes, he thought. He leaned further over to see them more clearly. Under his breath the water ruffled and the reflection blurred. These are my lungs, he thought, and they are still pumping. He dipped his
hand into the puddle, breaking the surface—and these are my hands which can destroy this image.

Destroy, he thought. But construct? To hate. But can I still do something else? Hatred alone is little. To live, man needs more than hatred.

He straightened himself. He saw Bucher approaching. He has got it, he thought. And he is still young.

“509,” said Bucher. “Have you heard? The crematorium’s no longer working.”

“Not possible!”

“The cremation gang is dead. It seems they haven’t chosen a new one yet. I wonder why? Could—”

They looked at each other. “Could they no longer have any use for it? Could they already be—”

Bucher stopped. “Pulling out?” said 509.

“Maybe. This morning they didn’t even come for the dead.”

Rosen and Sulzbacher came over. “The artillery has stopped,” said Rosen. “I wonder what’s going on?”

“Maybe they’ve broken through.”

“Or been thrown back. They say the SS intend to defend the camp.”

“Latrine rumor. There’s a new one every five minutes. If they really defend the camp, we’ll be bombed.”

509 looked up. I wish it was already night again, he thought. It is easier to hide in the dark. Who knows what may happen yet? The day had many hours, and death required no more than seconds. Many deaths could be hidden in the shimmering hours the sun brought up mercilessly from the horizon.

“There’s a plane!” Sulzbacher suddenly shouted.

Excitedly he pointed at the sky. After a while they all saw the
tiny speck. “It must be German!” whispered Rosen. “Otherwise there’d be an alarm.”

They looked around for a hiding place. There had been rumors that German planes had been ordered to bomb the camp off the face of the earth at the last moment.

“It’s only one! Just a single one.”

They remained standing. For a bombardment more than one plane would probably have been sent out. “Maybe it’s an American observation plane,” said Lebenthal, who had suddenly turned up. “They no longer sound the alarm for them.”

“How d’you know?”

Lebenthal didn’t answer. They all stared at the speck that grew rapidly larger. “That’s no German plane,” said Sulzbacher.

Now they could see the plane clearly. It came darting straight towards the camp. 509 felt as though from the earth a fist were dragging his intestines to the ground. It was as though he were standing naked on a platform, being sacrificed to a sinister, down-plunging, murderous deity, without being able to flee. He noticed that the others lay flat on the ground and couldn’t understand why he had remained standing.

At this moment there came a rattle of shots. The plane pulled itself out of its plunging flight, turned, and circled around the camp. The shots had come from the camp. Machine guns were firing from behind the SS quarters. The plane flew still lower. Everyone stared up at it. And suddenly it moved its wings. It looked as though it were beckoning with them. At first the prisoners thought it had been hit; but it made another round and the wings moved twice again, up and down, like the wings of a bird. Then it rose in flight and sped away. Shots rang out after it. They even began firing from several towers. But soon the machine guns fell silent and only the drone of the engine could be heard.

“It was a signal,” said Bucher.

“It looked as though it were beckoning with its wings. Like someone beckoning with his hand.”

“It was a signal for us! I’m sure. What else?”

“It wanted to show they know we’re here! It was for us! It can’t have been anything else. What do you think, 509?”

“I think so, too.”

It was the first sign they had received from the outside world since they had been in the camp. The terrible isolation of the years had been pierced. Suddenly they realized that for the world they were not dead. Someone was thinking of them. Unknown rescuers had beckoned to them. They were no longer alone. It was the first visible greeting from freedom. They were no longer the scum of the earth. Someone had sent a plane to assure them that the world knew about them, and would come to their rescue. They were no longer the scum of the earth, despised, spat upon, lower than worms—they were human beings again—for human beings who didn’t know them.

What’s wrong with me? thought 509. Tears? I? An old man?

Neubauer examined the suit. Selma had hung it in the forefront of his wardrobe. He took the hint. Civilian—he hadn’t worn that since 1933. A pepper-and-salt suit. Ridiculous. He lifted it from the hanger and examined it. Then he took off his uniform, walked to the door of the bedroom, locked it, and tried on the jacket. It was too tight. He couldn’t button it; not even when he pulled in his stomach. He stepped before the mirror. He looked silly. He must have put on at least thirty or forty pounds. No wonder, after all. Before ’33 they’d had to be damned economical.

Strange how determination left one’s face when the uniform was
gone! One grew wobbly, soft. Felt like it, too. He examined the trousers. They would fit even less than the jacket. No use trying them on. What was the point of it all, anyhow?

He would surrender the camp, correctly. They would treat him correctly—military style. For that, there existed traditions, etiquette, military codes. After all, one was a soldier oneself. As good as a soldier. A wearer of a uniform. High-ranking officer.

Neubauer stretched himself. He might be interned, that was possible. Probably only for a short while. Maybe in a castle in the neighborhood, with gentlemen of the same rank. He deliberated about how he should surrender the camp. Military style, of course. No Hitler salute, with raised arm. No, better not. Soldierly, hand to the cap-peak.

He took a few steps and saluted. Not stiff, not like a junior officer. He tried it once more. It wasn’t so easy to produce the proper combination of correctness and elegant dignity. The hand flew too high. Still that damned Hitler salute. Come to think of it, an idiotic way to salute for grown-up men. Throwing up the arm like that—all right for Boy Scouts, but not for officers. Queer how one had done it for so long!

He again tried the military salute. Slower! Not so fast. He watched his reflection in the wardrobe mirror, took several steps back, and strode towards himself—“Herr General, I herewith surrender—”

Something like that. In the old days one handed over the sword at the same time. Napoleon III at Sedan; he remembered that from his schooldays. He had no sword. Revolver? Out of the question! On the other hand, he wouldn’t be able to keep any weapons. For occasions like this one regretted not having had proper military training. Should he take off belt and holster beforehand?

He again tried a few steps. Not too close, of course. Halt several yards in front. “Herr General—”

Perhaps even: Herr Comrade. No—not when it was a General.
But perhaps a sharp salute and a clasp of the hand. Short, correct. No hand-shaking. After all, the respect of one enemy for another. Officer to officer. Actually comrades all, broadly speaking, even though from enemy camps. One had lost, after a valiant fight. The respect due to the honorably defeated.

Neubauer felt the former post-office clerk rise in him. He was aware of it as an historical moment. “Herr General—”

Dignified. Then the clasp of the hand. Perhaps a brief meal together, as one had been told of chivalrous opponents. Rommel with British prisoners. Pity one couldn’t speak any English. Well, there were interpreters enough among the prisoners in the camp.

How quickly one grew accustomed to the old way of saluting! Fundamentally, one had never been a fanatical Nazi. Far rather an official, a loyal official of the Fatherland. Weber and men like him, Dietz and his clique, they were Nazis.

Neubauer fetched himself a cigar. Romeo and Juliet. Better smoke them up. Four or five could be left in the box. Could eventually be offered to the opponent. A good cigar could smooth out many things.

He took a few puffs. What if the opponent wanted to see the camp? All right. If there should be anything they didn’t like, he had only acted on orders. Often with a bleeding heart. Soldiers understood that. But—