Hubert and I went to find a bunk, but all the Blocks were full to bursting. Seeing men still streaming into the camp, a dismayed Hubert led me to the wooden steps of one of them. “This is at least better than lying in the snow.”
Hubert folded his blanket for us to sit on, and we covered ourselves with mine. We huddled close to each other.
“Is there any of my birthday present left?”
I reached into the blanket wrapped over my shoulder. There was a mouthful for both of us, then I remembered the sweaters.
“This is definitely the best birthday present I’ve ever gotten,”
Hubert said as he pulled the third sweater over his head.
We awoke in each other’s arms just as dawn began to break.
The blanket covering us was frozen stiff. Laid out in front of us on the snow-covered ground were grotesquely contorted bodies. One frozen man was just about to take a bite of bread. There were crumbs on his tongue. These men had dragged themselves all the way from Auschwitz for nothing. Hubert and I knew we were lucky.
Without the loaf of bread and the sweaters layered over our bodies we would have been part of that icy mortuary.
For three days we mindlessly milled about Gleiwitz without anything to eat. The dead were everywhere, stacked in the snow like kindling, piled behind the Blocks like discarded rags or just left where they dropped. The SS made no attempt to remove any of them. For three nights Hubert and I slept on those steps, and the more our bellies cried, the colder it seemed until we could barely sleep at all. The only crumbs of hope came from the distant sounds of battle.
On the fourth day, the Häftlinge who were squatting in a barn-like structure in the center of the camp were driven out into the snow by the guards. The guards then emptied the Blocks, lining us all in front of the entrance of the “barn.” The rumor circulated that we were going to leave as we filed into the building one by one.
The SS were handing out bread rations at the door.
Nearly a hundred Häftlinge had entered by the time it was my turn. Since the “barn” had no windows, I was momentarily blind when I stepped through the doorway with my bread. I held both hands out in front of me so I wouldn’t bump into anybody. Someone tore the bread out of my hands and ran. I tried to catch him, but I slammed into a wall of bodies. I yelled to Hubert, who was behind me, to guard his ration well.
How could one of my fellow Häftling be that dirty? Easily answered, but how could I have been that careless? Stupidity like that could cost me my life. Thankfully, Hubert was willing to share and wouldn’t take no for an answer. When the SS couldn’t squeeze another Häftling into the “barn,” they marched us out. I eyed my fellow prisoners. Which one was the thief? There was no way to tell, so I put a jinx on the whole bunch.
Our guards led us to a train parked on a solitary track next to the camp. I happily climbed into one of the open freight cars. My heels hadn’t recovered enough to endure another trek on foot. Hubert was right behind me. There were at least seventy men in our car. I pulled the door shut to keep any more from getting in. Four Kapos and their Piepels stretched out on the floor, taking up space for twenty. Hubert and I crouched down in one corner. I was thankful that I had enough room to sit comfortably and move my stiff limbs.
The train sat idle for hours. The falling snow that settled on our caps and shoulders slowly melted, until the car seemed to be steaming. A few squadrons of German fighter planes flew over us.
How close was the Red Army? I wondered. The frantic voices coming from the other cars made me think we were all asking the same question: Would this train become one of their targets?
I heard trampling outside our car. The SS were bringing up another pack of “pajamas.” A Häftling climbed up and looked into our car. All he saw were the lounging Kapos. “Na, die liegen da wie ein Gott in Frankreich!” (They’re lying there like God in France!) he exclaimed in a shrill voice.
From the accent, I could tell the bastard was Hungarian. His words flooded another forty men into our car. Now we all had to stand like asparagus in a can. The Kapos cursed and threw blows, but there was simply no more room. We should have lynched them as soon as they had spread out on the floor, but the whole lot of us could barely walk, let alone kick open someone’s skull.
Toward evening a sharp jolt signaled that a locomotive had been attached to the train, and shortly thereafter we began to roll. The icy wind, choked with biting, black smoke, whistled in my ears, stung my eyes, and made me spit coal soot. Wrapped in our blankets, we looked like a shipment of veiled statues. We rode standing all night, but somehow I must have gone to sleep because the next thing I knew it was getting light. Some of the statues around me looked as if they had been placed on pedestals. I slowly grasped that they were standing on corpses. The Kapos were now sitting comfortably in a corner. Hubert whispered that they had made room by beating and strangling as many Muselmänner as they could get their hands on. This had put everyone on edge, and the tension was palpable. An accidental kick would start a rabid fight that would set off others like wildfire.
Somewhere, two men were swearing at each other. I recognized the strident voice of the asshole who had created this whole stew. A Kapo did as well. He stood up and barreled his way to the Hungarian. He grabbed him by the throat and pounded him unmercifully.
The Hungarian fell back onto other men, who flung their fists at him. He cried out, pleading for his life, but no one was listening.
Pulling himself up, he straddled one of the walls of the car. The speed of the train seemed to frighten him more than the blows he had received. The Kapo charged and knocked him off, but somehow the Hungarian hung on by his fingertips. Wild-eyed, he struggled to climb back in. Hands and fists rebuffed him. He hung there one minute, two, then the Kapo lost patience and took off his boot.
Bringing the heel down like a hammer, he crushed the man’s fingers. Screaming, the Hungarian fell. A burst from a submachine gun bid him a bon voyage.
The second day in the car, Hubert came down with a fever and began coughing terribly. I made enough space for him to sit and to enable me to shield him from the train’s frigid draft. I fed him snow to quench his fevered thirst. “You have to hold on, Hubert. We’ll be in a warm Block soon.”
“We’ll be going fishing again, won’t we?” Hubert coughed.
On Thursdays, when the schools in France were closed, a few of us would pack a picnic lunch and pedal to the Pointe St. Hospice, a cape between Nice and Monaco. We were always able to catch enough fish for a hearty pot of bouillebaisse.
“Hubert, do you remember the novices?”
His eyes seemed to light up. Everyday at noon, the good sisters from the convent took the novices in their white dresses for a stroll on the path circling the cape. The trail passed over a grotto where we would sip beer and lie in wait. The elements had washed a crevasse in the pavement right over our heads. It forced the novices to take a wide step.
“I only remember the novices who weren’t wearing panties,” Hubert murmured.
“I only remember the one who straddled the gap as she admired the view. Boy, did I get sand in my eyes that day.”
Hubert went into a coughing fit. I realized that conversation, even if it was about girls, wasn’t the best medicine for him, so I fed him more snow and let him doze.