What World is Left (15 page)

Rolling her eyes like that was a very brave thing to do. It was also the closest anyone came to telling Dr. Hvass the truth. All the prisoners who were there hoped he would understand the woman's double message and why she rolled her eyes.

But Dr. Hvass just smiled like a puppet. “That's exactly why I've come,” he said, shaking the woman's hand and not seeming to notice how bony her fingers were or how her fingernails were misshapen from fungus. “To have a good look around.”

Just then, Mother said, three prisoners walked into the kitchen, singing a German song.

It turned out Dr. Hvass spoke some German and that the song was one of his favorites. And so he joined in. Then Rahm had started singing too.

If, when we heard about it later, the whole thing hadn't been so evil and twisted, we might have laughed. Instead we try to tell each other the Danish visit won't affect us. In fact, as Father says, the Embellishment may buy us time. And that night, for the first time since we came to Theresienstadt, there are two scraps of meat in our soup—though still not enough to require a knife. Those two scraps, I suppose, are a reward for our cooperation. If I weren't so hungry, I'd spit them right out.

The next morning, the countess hears Commandant Rahm whistling in the main square. The countess passes the news on to Mother and Frau Davidels. Soon the old woman is talking. Apparently, Rahm stopped whistling long enough to tell one of his underlings: “There's been
an exciting development. The visit was such a success that now we're going to produce a film!”

On Monday morning, when I open the door to the diet kitchen, three women workers are gossiping by the sink. Usually, Monday morning gossip has to do with which couples were spotted going into which cubbyholes the day before, and which husbands or wives are being betrayed. But today, because of the way the women's backs are hunched and how close they are standing to each other, I know they are discussing more serious matters. Matters I'm not supposed to know about.

So I do what any self-respecting girl in my position would do: I listen in. The stories children aren't supposed to hear are always the most interesting.

“It's an absolute disgrace,” one of the women hisses.

“The people involved in the Embellishment and now in this film are making it worse for all of us. They're prolonging the war by helping the Nazis spread their lies,” another woman says. Then she spits into the sink to emphasize her disgust.

Of course, I think about Father. He helped with the Enbellishment. But then, didn't we all?

The third woman sighs. “Have you two heard what that numbskull Hvass wrote in his report?”

The other two haven't heard.

“He said the living conditions here were relatively good. Can you believe that, ‘relatively good'?”

One of the women makes a snorting sound.

“At this rate,” the first woman says, “the rest of the world will never do a thing to help us. We'll perish in this model city.”

“If they don't ship us east first.”

I know the Embellishment was a lie, but now, for the first time, I see that it may well have made things worse for all of us. Much worse. “Oh no,” I say. I mean to stay quiet, but the words slip out. What the women are saying makes perfect sense. Father is wrong. There
was
harm in the Embellishment, and there will be more harm in the film Commandant Rahm is planning. If the rest of the world can be convinced that life for the prisoners in Theresienstadt is relatively good, they'll never intervene on our behalf. Or on behalf of the prisoners in other camps who have it even worse than us.

I've been a prisoner in Theresienstadt since April, 1943, more than two years now. But I have never felt more trapped than I do at this moment. There is nowhere to go. I shall never get out of this dreadful place. No one will ever come to my rescue!

The women turn to the door where I am standing. When they see it is me who has spoken, they get busy with their work. One sloshes water around in a bucket; another reaches for the scrub brushes. The third woman tightens her apron and tucks her hair behind her ears so it won't get in her way while she works.

I feel their eyes on me as I go to collect my scrub brush from the shelf by the sink.

“Her father's that Dutch artist. The bald one. Joseph Van Raalte. He is part of the Embellishment,” one of the women mutters under her breath, but loud enough so I will hear her disapproval. “And now I've heard he's going to work on that godforsaken film.”

The skin on my arms and legs begins to itch. Though I bathed about ten days ago, I feel filthy. Outside, and inside. My father is helping the Nazis carry out their evil plan. And I am benefiting from my father's situation. It's because of him that we have our own apartment. It's because of him that we haven't been shipped off on a transport. It's because of him that Commandant Rahm sent Opa to us.

I scratch my skin so hard I leave a trail of red fingernail marks along my arm. But that doesn't make the dirty feeling go away.

Father hasn't said much about the film, though he tells Petr Kien it won't be a standard documentary. Of course not, I want to shout when I hear the two of them talking. Documentary films are made to tell the truth; this is going to be a propaganda film. It will tell lies! And everybody knows it. Including Father—and me.

The Nazi high command in Berlin is so pleased with the results of the Danish Red Cross commission visit,
they have decided to shoot a film about Theresienstadt. This way, they can show the whole world what a wonderful place we live in. The plan makes me feel sick. I ache all over everywhere and it isn't my muscles or my bones, it's my heart. The worst part is that there's nothing I can do about any of it.

A prisoner named Kurt Geron will direct the film. I've seen Herr Geron around the camp, a small round man with a dark head of hair and a wide mouth, a little like a clown's. He was a famous stage actor in Berlin and later an important film director. Mother gets a little stage struck in his presence. “I saw him in
Blue Angel
opposite Marlene Dietrich. He was wonderful,” she tells me. “One day I'd like to ask him what Marlene Dietrich was like. As a person, I mean.”

Of course, Geron didn't have much choice when Rahm ordered him to produce the film. Had he refused to go along with the Nazis' plan, Geron and his wife would have been sent on the next transport east. But when I see him sitting on his canvas chair with the word
Directeur
sewn in bold letters on the back, and telling people where to stand and sit so he can get the best shots, I know it isn't just a matter of following orders. I can tell Geron takes pleasure in his task. I know from the way his eyes are shining that he enjoys feeling important and having people to order around. He seems to have forgotten that he is helping the Nazis spread their lies.

The film already has a title:
The Fuhrer Gives a City to the Jews
. And Geron cannot make the film alone.
All of us will have to cooperate when the film crew is around. And before the final filming can begin, the Nazis will have to approve a series of set drawings, drawings that will detail, scene by scene, what the film will show.

And who is the only artist talented enough to handle this assignment?

Why, Father, of course.

The pit Father has dug for himself and us is getting deeper. First there was the mural, then the signs. And now there is this film. This sickening phony film! There are new lines on Father's forehead and his eyes are looking glassy. I try to console myself by thinking that at least Father does not seem to be taking the same pleasure Geron does in his task.

It is bedtime. Opa has dozed off. So far, he isn't snoring, but that can change at any moment. I hear Mother in the bathroom, playing a game with Theo that she used to play with me.

“I'm mailing you,” she tells Theo in a teasing voice. Then I hear her make a ripping sound that is meant to be the sound of the brown wrapping paper coming off the roll. “I'll need stamps,” she adds, and then I hear her smacking her lips as she pretends to lick the backs of the imaginary stamps. For a moment, I close my eyes and try to pretend I am back in Broek and that Mother is playing the game with me. But my imagination is not
strong enough tonight. I'm too sad, too angry and too confused. Father is doing what he must to keep us all alive, but there is a cost. How shall we be able to live with ourselves if this propaganda film helps prolong the war and brings about the deaths of more innocent people?

“Where shall I mail you to tonight?” Mother asks Theo. “Paris? New York, perhaps? We've never been to New York. They say it's a grand city with buildings that reach to the sky.”

At first, Theo doesn't say a thing. He is considering his answer. “Broek,” he says at last. “Send me home.” I know exactly how Theo feels. I so want to go home. But I also know that if we ever do return home, everything will have changed. I will never see Father—or myself—in the same way. I tug at my necklace and study the tiny picture of Broek. But tonight it brings me little comfort.

Father is sitting on the bench, staring at nothing in particular, his eyes glassy. I can't hold things in anymore. I need to talk to Father. I need to tell him how I feel about what he's doing.

So I tap his shoulder, a little too hard. Father turns around. He looks surprised, as if I've awakened him from a dream.

“Do you
have
to do it?” I ask him.

“Do what, Anneke?”

Now it's my turn to be surprised. How can Father not know what I am talking about? It's all I've been
thinking about these last months. I watch Father's face. He is scrunching his forehead. I think he knows.

I feel a little dizzy, as if the floorboards beneath us have shifted. I've been angry at Father. I've blamed him and Mother for not getting us out of Holland in time, but I have never questioned him before. Never acted as if I understood more than him. But now I feel as if I do. As if I see things Father simply refuses to see. Because he's too afraid.

“You know,” I say, a little hesitantly at first, but my voice grows stronger as I speak. “Do you have to make those drawings for the movie?”

Part of me already knows the answer. Yes, Father has to make the drawings. Just like Geron has to make the movie. If they refuse, both risk being sent on the next transport, along with their families. Which means us. Me. But at the same time, Father must know what he is doing is terribly wrong. If only he would at least admit it!

When Father stands up, he towers over me. His blue eyes shine and his nostrils flare like a horse's. I get a sinking feeling in my legs. Perhaps I've gone too far. But I can't take back my question. It hangs between us in the air like the smell of something rotting.

“You haven't the right to ask me that, child!” Father says, his voice booming. “No right at all.” Then he lifts his hand, and for a second, I think he is going to slap me. In all my life, neither Father nor Mother has ever lifted a hand against me. The floorboards feel as if they are shifting again, only more quickly now. I take a step
back toward the wall. Father lets his hand drop back to his side; then he sits back down on the bench. The bench lists to one side. He is breathing hard.

I think about apologizing, but I don't. Because I'm not sorry.

No, I'm glad I've finally spoken up. Why won't Father do the same? Why won't he tell the Nazis he won't draw lies? But already, I know the answer. He can't tell them anything. He can't speak up to them the way I've just spoken up to him. If he does, he risks everything. Everything!

As I try to settle on my mattress, I feel my heart pump in my chest. My temples throb. But it isn't a bad feeling. That's because, for the first time since Franticek and Hannelore left Theresienstadt, I feel a little bit alive again.

My sadness isn't gone. But at this very moment, it seems as if my fiery red anger has somehow burned the old sadness to ashes.

There are people who sneer when the film crew passes with its cameras and tripods and ladders and lights. Kurt Geron barks orders: “A little to the left! No, no a little more! Now there's too much sun in your eyes! Haven't you heard a single thing I've said?”

People whisper that Geron's big belly looks even bigger now that it is swollen with pride. “Perhaps Herr
Directeur has been eating
wienershnitzel
with his good friend the commandant,” someone adds.

Several cameramen have been assigned to work with Geron, including a Czech Christian who was hired by Commandant Rahm for the project. And Father is usually hovering somewhere nearby with his sketchbook, comparing the scenes Geron is shooting with the ones in the sketchbook Commandant Rahm approved.

Geron and his crew film children playing in the newly constructed playground. Of course Geron is fussy about which children can appear in his film. “They have to look Jewish—and robust,” I hear him say when he is rounding up children for that scene.

“Not her,” he says, when he sees me. “Too blond and too bony.”

Of course, there are few robust-looking people in Theresienstadt. When a woman suggests that if we children had a little more to eat we might look stronger, Geron pretends not to hear.

That is when I realize that though Geron is directing the film, he, too, is playing a role. He's been cast as the great film director. In that way, he is as much a puppet as the rest of us. The thought makes me feel angry with Geron and sorry for him, all at the same time. It's how I feel toward Father.

It is decided that a concert, performed by an orchestra of prisoners, will make another fine scene in the film. After all, what better way is there to show the world that the population of Theresienstadt is exposed to high culture?

Geron has asked Father and Mother to sit in the audience. Because he plans to seat them near the front of the café where the scene will be filmed, they'll have to wear their best clothes.