The German Suitcase (11 page)

CHAPTER NINTEEN

Having resisted the impulse to cut Dan Epstein down to size, Tannen took Stacey and Steinbach aside to deal with his ultimatum. They were huddled in a corner of Zach Bolden’s studio around a console that was outfitted with digital photo-editing and printing equipment. Indeed, the technical aspects of commercial photography had changed dramatically since Tannen had his studio twenty years ago. Developing negatives and making contact sheets from which the best shots were selected for enlargement had gone the way of carbon paper and typewriters—as had darkrooms with their macabre glow, tyrannosaurus-like enlargers, trays of pungent chemicals and tedious procedures. The results of a session could be evaluated immediately, now; and Bolden was sitting in front of two 40-inch flat-screen monitors, scrolling through the shots he had just taken. Like the cigarette butt photographs Stacey had extolled, these were gritty, textured, high-resolution black and white images that on first glance were exactly what she, and the others, had envisioned; but as Bolden mouse-clicked through them, they could all see that the key element was missing.

“Not what we were hoping for, are they, Zach?” Tannen prompted.

“Not even close,” Bolden replied grimly. “They’re flat, staged, without personality. It’s as if we hired an actor to play the part…a bad actor.”

“Yeah, Jake’s the guy who lived it but you’d never know it,” Steinbach said clearly distraught. “It’s just not coming through.”

Tannen nodded emphatically. “He’s not engaged. His eyes don’t have that—that Jake sparkle, that mischievous twinkle, do they Stace?”

Stacey responded with a preoccupied nod. She had been watching Jake from afar and, once again, felt responsible for the old fellow’s plight. He sensed what was going on, but wasn’t quite sure what it meant, and appeared bewildered. “I think he looks terribly lonely,” Stacey said thinking out loud as she wracked her brain for a solution.

“Whatever, this is a disaster,” Steinbach growled through clenched teeth. He fired a challenging look at Stacey. “Well, here’s where the rubber meets the road, kid. Got any brilliant ideas?”

“Yup,” Stacey replied without missing a beat. “You’re the one who promised him it was going to be fun, right?”

“Yeah, so?” Steinbach fired-back.

“Well it’s obvious it isn’t. Look at him, all by himself out there. I think it’s time you—”

“No shit Sherlock,” Steinbach snapped. “Don’t give me psychobabble. Give me an idea!”

Stacey’s eyes flashed with anger then, resisting the temptation to retaliate, she said, “Hey, you’re the client, Mr. Steinbach; and the client’s always right, but…” She paused and held up her hands defensively, as if anticipating an onslaught of blows. “…with all due respect, you’re wrong on this one, dead wrong.”

“Me? Wrong? Why?” Steinbach challenged, rapid-fire.

“Because you didn’t let me finish.”

“I’m listening,” Steinbach muttered grudgingly.

“Good. I was about to say, it’s time to roll up your sleeves and make good on that promise. Your sleeves, Mr. S. Roll them up. You know what I mean?”

Steinbach’s eyes narrowed in confusion. He was on the verge of unleashing another scathing rejoinder when they brightened with understanding. “Yeah, I do, I sure as hell do.” His wiry frame sprang into action as he removed his jacket and tie, and rolled his sleeves up above his elbows, revealing the Auschwitz tattoo on his forearm. “Come on Jake, loosen up. It’s time to have some fun,” he said, striding across the backdrop paper to where the old fellow was sitting on the suitcase in a weary slouch. “You remember I said two old Jews sticking it to the Nazis? Well, that’s exactly what this damn near seventy year-old Jew and this damn near ninety-year-old Jew are going to do! A hundred and sixty years of old Jews are going to roll up their sleeves and stick it to ‘em! Don’t just sit there, Jake. Come on! Roll ‘em up!”

Jake looked a little uncertain at first; then, his eyes came to life. He got to his feet and, with Steinbach’s assistance, removed his jacket and tie, and rolled up his sleeves, revealing that he, too, had a number, preceded by the letter A, tattooed on his forearm.

Steinbach caught Stacey’s eye and nodded smartly in tribute, getting an affirming fist-pump in return. “We didn’t just tour the continent on the fucking Orient Express, did we, Jake?!” he went on, rhetorically. “No, we just survived a harrowing journey; and that’s how we should look! Like tough, proud, Holocaust survivors!” he exclaimed, mussing Jake’s neatly combed hair into windblown thatches. “Are we having fun yet?”

“We sure as hell are!” Jake replied, erupting with laughter. He looked across the studio to where Hannah was seated with Dan and blew her a kiss; then he sat on the suitcase, folding his arms across his chest. The Auschwitz tattoo was clearly visible.

Steinbach had stepped behind him and, standing just off to one side, assumed a defiant, warrior-like posture with his arms folded across his chest in a way that displayed his tattoo. “How’s this?!” he called out to Bolden who, anxious to capture this electrifying moment, had just affixed a fresh digital back to his camera. “Hope you’ve got some film left in that thing.”

As the strobes began flashing again, Adam, who had been quietly observing it all, tilted his head as if trying to recall something. He squinted at the suitcase, staring at the white lettering that was visible between Jake’s legs; and, as if cued by a strobe flash, made the connection that had eluded him earlier. His fingers began flipping the pages of his notepad. “Help me out here, will you?” he said, drifting to Stacey who was clearly delighted by what her exchange with Steinbach had instigated. “I’m confused.”

“What about?”

“Dr. Epstein’s age. I’m pretty sure Google had his DOB as 1920. I think that’s what he said the other day, too, isn’t it?”

“I guess. I don’t know. I just heard Steinbach say he was damn-near ninety…”

“Yeah, me too,” Adam said, still checking his notes. “Here it is: Born…1920.”

“Well, that computes…”

“I know, but the DOB painted on the suitcase is nineteen twenty-two.”

“Oh.” Stacey shrugged. “So? What’s the big deal?”

“It’s called fact-checking, remember? You’ve spent too much time in the ad game making them up. I don’t have that luxury.”

“Come on, according to my daddy, Grandpa Dutton wasn’t sure which side of the Rio Grande he was born on, let alone in what year. These old-timers didn’t pop out of the womb stamped with a bar code that got logged into a computer.”

“Yeah, but you know the
Times
. Ever since Jason Blair…” Adam said, referring to the reporter who just a few years ago had fabricated dozens of news stories, “…they’re back to fact-checking whether the earth orbits the sun or vice-versa.”

Stacey laughed. “Hey it’s a dirty job, Clive, but somebody’s got to do it.”

CHAPTER TWENTY

After passing the envelope to her mother’s contact at the train station and returning to the townhouse in Bogenhausen with her father, Anika Kleist turned her attention to what Jake and Eva would need while in hiding at the abandoned cabin in Partnach Gorge. Giving Max and Eva as much time together as possible, Anika, Jake, and Tovah, the housekeeper, went about gathering blankets, quilts, canned foodstuffs, tins of biscuits, and bottles of water, along with a box of candles and a flashlight—all of which they carried down to the garage and began loading into Anika’s Volkswagen.

“I’ve never gotten a flat,” Anika said in her spirited way, as she removed the spare tire and hardboard liner from the car’s forward trunk to maximize space. “And I’ve just decided I never will.”

“Good,” Jake said with a nervous laugh. “Because I’ve never changed one.”

“And you won’t have to…at least not tomorrow.”

Tovah found a small electric heater in one of the storage lockers at the rear of the garage. It fit snugly in the foot-well behind the driver’s seat.

The next morning, Anika put the German Shepherd in the back seat and pulled the car out into the driveway where Eva, Jake, and Max—a jarring presence amidst the falling snow in his black SS uniform—were waiting. He would be leaving to report for duty as soon as the others departed, and had dressed accordingly. Jake shoe-horned his newly acquired suitcase into the trunk and got in the back seat next to the dog. The time Max and Eva had long dreaded had come, and they were standing aside, clinging to this last moment.

“This wasn’t how I wanted you to remember me,” Max said, referring to the uniform.

Eva set her rucksack on the ground and removed the framed snapshot of them that she had taken from her flat. “This is how I will remember you,” she said handing it to him. “How I will remember us…always…”

“I…I can’t believe it’s come to this,” Max said softly. “God how I wish we—“

“Enough…” Eva said, eyes welling with emotion. She hugged him tightly, then got in the car next to Anika. Max put the picture in the rucksack, then stuffed it into the trunk. He forced the lid closed and looked up at Eva who smiled wistfully as the wipers swept across the windshield in front of her. “Please go,” she said to Anika, overcome by the sense of finality. “I can’t bear it. I just can’t. Please…”

Max watched them drive off, wondering if he would ever see Eva again. When the car was gone, he adopted a more erect, military posture and shook the snow from his greatcoat; then, Dr. Maximilian Kleist, Captain, Waffen-SS strode back into the house and went to the chapel where his parents were waiting. They spent a few moments, kneeling in prayer, then crossed themselves and went downstairs to the garage, joining Tovah and the chauffeur who was stowing Max’s duffel bag in the trunk of the Mercedes.

“Let us know where you are,” Gisela Kleist said, her voice quavering with emotion.

“Soon as I can,” Max replied, forcing a smile. “I’ll send you all postcards from the Riviera!”

“God be with you,” Tovah said, softly in Yiddish.

“And with you, Tovah,” Max replied in the language she had taught him as a child. “May He be with all of you and with Eva and Jake.” He hugged his mother, shook his father’s hand, and got into the car with the chauffeur. In less than fifteen minutes Max would be at SS Headquarters on Schellingstrasse where his orders awaited.

While Max was bidding farewell to his parents, Anika was driving across Munich to the Bundesstrasse No. 2, the roadway that cuts through the Alpine foothills to the town of Starnberg 30 kilometers to the south. The weather made driving hazardous, and it took an hour to reach the checkpoint at the northern tip of Lake Starnberger, a desolate area of iron-gray trees and drifting snow. The road narrowed and led to a bridge where a barricade marked with a swastika had been set up. A guardhouse stood nearby. Wisps of smoke curled from a stovepipe that pierced its snow-covered roof. A Nazi flag hung stiffly from a pole affixed to the facade. As the slush-spattered Volkswagen approached, a sergeant came from the guardhouse and walked toward the bridge. A sidearm hung from a belt that encircled his greatcoat. Anika slowed, expecting he would raise the barricade and wave her on as he always did. Instead, he held up a hand, forcing her to stop, and then stepped to the driver’s window. Anika sighed and lowered it. The close-set eyes of a face she didn’t recognize stared at her from beneath a Nazi helmet.

“You are going where, fraulein?” the sergeant asked, his breath coming in gray puffs as he spoke.

“Skiing,” Anika replied, impatiently as the wipers chattered across the windshield. “Can we go now? We’re losing all the warmth in here.”

“Skiing where?”

“Garmisch-Partenkirchen, as I do most weekends in season. Ask Lieutenant Junger. He’ll tell you.”

“I don’t see any skis,” the sergeant went on, unmoved by her protestations.

“They’re in our chalet on Eibsee.”

“Eibsee,” the sergeant echoed as if impressed. “A rich brat from Munich. A good-looking one too.” He reached through the open window and started toying with Anika’s hair. The dog growled and lunged from the back seat, snapping at his hand. The sergeant shrieked in pain. His eyes darted to the blood oozing from a gouge on one of his knuckles. He cursed and drew his sidearm, aiming it at the dog’s head.

“No!” Anika shouted, shoving the Luger aside. It fired, wildly, sending Eva and Jake diving for cover.

A lieutenant came running from the guardhouse with his sidearm drawn. “What’s going on, here?!”

“Her fucking dog bit me!”

“With good reason!” Anika retorted.

The lieutenant recognized her and holstered his pistol. “Lower your weapon,” he commanded, glaring at the sergeant. “Holster it. Now!”

The sergeant seethed with anger, then complied.

“Fraulien Kleist,” the lieutenant said, sounding embarrassed. “My sincere apologies.”

“Accepted,” Anika said, with a smile that could have melted the frost forming on his helmet. “It’s always good to see you, Lieutenant Junger.”

“The pleasure is all mine. Please excuse my sergeant’s rudeness. He’s newly posted and eager to prove himself. I hope you won’t feel compelled to report this to your father.”

“No, I don’t think that will be necessary.”

“Thank you for understanding.” The lieutenant gestured to the barricade, prompting the sergeant to raise it. “You idiot!” he bellowed as Anika drove off across the bridge. “You know who her father is?! Herr Konrad Kleist. Head of Kleist Industries and close friend of the Führer!”

Inside the car, Anika glanced to the rearview mirror to see the checkpoint receding in the distance. “How’d I do?” she prompted stimulated by the encounter.

“You’ve got a lot of chutzpah,” Eva replied.

“Yeah, enough for all of us,” Jake chimed-in. “There’s a little puddle on the seat back here…”

Kunst barked as if in protest.

“…and it wasn’t the dog,” Jake added with a self-deprecating cackle.

They still had almost 60 kilometers to go before they would reach Partnach Gorge and the abandoned cabin; and for the next several hours, Anika drove south through Traubing, and across the Hirschberg-Alm, continuing on to Weilheim and into the twisting, snow-blanketed hills of the Murnau district.

“Max and I spent summers here when we were growing up,” she said, driving down Marktstrasse, Murnau’s main street that was lined with shops. “My parents rented a villa on the lake every year before we bought the place on Eibsee. I learned to drive on these roads. See that building?” She went on, indicating an Art Nouveau facade draped in snow. “Kandinsky had a studio there. He and his artist buddies.”

“The Blaue Reiter group,” Eva said. “They were in the Biennale when I was in college,” she went on, referring to the international exhibition held in Venice on odd numbered years. “Klee, Marc, Kandinsky, Gabrielle Munter…She was his girlfriend for a while, right?”

“Sure was,” Anika said, impressed by the depth of Eva’s knowledge. “My mother began buying their work when she opened her gallery after the war. The large Kandinsky in the library was painted when he was living here. It’s called Concert.”

“I really like the one in Max’s room,” Eva said. “Murnau With Church. The colors just resonate.”

“I like it too,” Anika chirped, brightly. “But Concert’s my favorite. It was inspired by Schoenberg’s violin concertos.”

They had crossed the Eschenloher Mos, a plain of marshes splashed with blinding frost, and on through the two short tunnels between Oberau and Frachant. Soon, the Garmisch-Partenkirchen Basin flattened out revealing the spectacular Zugspitze towering above the Wetterstein Range and the ski areas beyond. The artistic chatter had given way to a somber silence and the breathtaking vista went unnoticed.

The towns of Garmisch and Partenkirchen—joined in 1936 when the Winter Olympics were held there—were on opposite banks of the Partnach River. A contingent of Wermacht mountain troops was billeted in the dormitories where Olympic athletes once lived. A Nazi flag hung above the post office that served as its headquarters.

Anika took the Mittenwald turnoff, bypassing the town, and headed east toward the Gorge. She crossed the railroad tracks near Kainzenbad Station, angling into a narrow side road. It bordered a rock-walled canyon sheathed with ice where the river gushed in a tumbling rage. At the bottom of the gorge, they came to a snow-blanketed cabin built amidst craggy rocks and towering trees. Before leaving the car, they looked for evidence of squatters, but saw neither tire tracks, nor footprints between the cabin and an outhouse, nearby.

Jake found an unlocked window and climbed through it, letting Eva and Anika in through the front door. The cabin was almost as cold inside as out, making their every exhale visible. The dog began sniffing the air and padding about as if conducting an inspection. A table with a snapped leg and an armchair with threadbare upholstery were the only furnishings. The power had been turned off which meant the space heater would be of no use though the candles would come in handy.

“That ought to take the chill out of the place,” Jake said with a nod to the fireplace and cordwood stacked beside it.

“Which side of the bed do you want?” Eva joked, gesturing to the floor in front of the hearth.

Anika’s eyes narrowed with concern. “I don’t know about that. The smoke from the chimney could attract attention. I think it’s going to be shared-bodily-warmth beneath a pile of quilts for you two.” Then, trying to ease their anxiety, added, “Don’t fret. I’ll be back by the time you have the drapes hung.”

Indeed, this would be home for Eva and Jake until Anika returned from Munich with their forged papers. They searched the cabin for a place to sleep and found a small, windowless storage room behind the kitchen. It had no exterior walls, was free of drafts, and would conserve their body heat. They knew that if something went wrong and Anika was captured with them, she and her family would pay with their lives. So, after helping to unload the car and arrange the bedding on the storage room floor, Anika wished them luck and, accompanied by the dog, headed for the chalet on Eibsee several miles west of the Gorge.

Eva and Jake looked about the tiny room trying to comprehend what had become of them: Highly accomplished, much admired, life-saving physicians in Munich, one day. Fugitive Jews being hunted like animals, hiding out in a frigid cabin, the next. Exhausted, Eva lit one of the candles and, still bundled in her outerwear, crawled beneath the bedding. “Come on,” she said, gesturing Jake join her.

Jake hesitated, appearing to be uncomfortable at the prospect. “Maybe, I’ll read for a while,” he said, taking a book from his briefcase.

“My God,” Eva gasped at the steely-eyed image of Hitler staring from the dust jacket and the Gothic typography of the title that slashed boldly across the bottom in a red band. “You’re reading Mein Kampf?”

Jake smiled wearily. “Sorry. It’s camouflage. Getting caught reading All Quiet On the Western Front can be dangerous to one’s health.”

“So can exhaustion. Come on…” Eva sensed his discomfort, and added. “It’s okay. My brother and I used to sleep together all the time when we were little.”

“I’m not your brother, Eva,” Jake said with a sigh that hung in the cold air. He was sitting with his back against the wall, watching the light from the candle play across her face. His head was cocked to one side, his dark, unruly hair tumbling from beneath his cap. There was a look in his eyes Eva had never seen before. If she didn’t know better she would have thought it had the intensity of longing, of lust. “It must be the hand-me-downs,” she joked, suggesting that wearing Max’s clothing had affected Jake’s sense of identity.

“I’m not joking, Eva,” Jake said, sounding hurt. “I’m not your brother and we’re not little, and—”

“No, we’re all grown up, and that’s how we’re going to act,” Eva interrupted, her tone sharpening. “We’re going to do whatever it takes to keep from freezing to death. If that means pressing our bodies together, our clothed bodies, that’s what we’ll do.”

“Eva, listen, just for a moment,” Jake pleaded, his voice quavering with emotion. “That first day in class… my God it’s hard to believe it was almost three years ago…there you were, this spirited, intelligent, Jewish and, yes, incredibly beautiful, woman; and… and that’s when I knew why I had risked coming to Munich for Medical School. I’ve had feelings for you from that moment; but you and…and Max became…”

“And I have feelings for you, Jacob…” Eva said, putting a fingertip to his lips to silence him “…as a fine man, brilliant doctor, and dear friend; but this is no time to talk about it.”

“Of course it is. It may be the only time. We’re living from day to day. Moment to moment. There’s no future for us. We have only, now; and I’ve been waiting so long to tell you what’s in my heart…”

“You’re a sweet man, Jacob; but, you know mine belongs to Max. I’m in love with him, and want to be with him, and only him. There is no explanation for such things. They just are. I hope you understand.”

Jake’s posture slackened, his eyes glistening with remorse. “I’m sorry, Eva,” he said, lowering them in shame. “I’ve acted childishly, improperly.”