Jack doesn’t answer.
Froelich twists the corkscrew into the bottle. “A piece of wood here between the teeth”—he indicates with his finger—“so no screaming. They tie with string at the back of the head. The rope goes about the neck, so, and the other end is tied to a plank that is attached to the crane….” He describes the mechanics with the precision of the engineer he is. “We are ordered to watch or they will hang us too, it is to remind us of the reward for sabotage. The crane lifts them slowly … the SS have calculated this method. With hands tied behind, but the legs are free to move because this is the show, entertainment, ja? I heard once two secretaries from the office, one to say to her friend, ‘Hurry up, you miss the legs.’” He proffers the bottle. Jack complies, pushing his glass forward.
“They hang at the entrance to the tunnel, perhaps a metre and a half — five feet? — from the ground, so we must pass among the legs — they have lost their trousers, you pass through like curtains, the SS enjoy to watch this.” He lifts the lid once more and steam escapes. “Will you join me?” he asks, ladle poised over a bowl.
“No. Thanks, Henry, but I’m not hungry.”
Froelich returns to the table with his bowl. “It was used to be a mine,” he says, and eats.
“What?”
“Dora. In the Harz Mountains.”
“The rocket factory?”
“In a mountain cave.”
A secret, in a mountain cave, worked by slaves. It sounds like a fairy tale.
“Near Buchenwald,” says Froelich. “Near to Goethe’s home. They bring the Häftlinge—the prisoners — to dig to make the cave larger. With bare hands they have digged and many die. These are no Jews at first, these are French and Russian, German, English, Poles and Czechs and many others. They wear the triangle, many different colours, but all wear the stripes. And on our feet, the wooden clogs, bare in winter also. In the beginning, the slaves must sleep in the earth with the rockets and many die.” Froelich raises another spoonful to his lips but pauses. “You see, the Nazis have two intentions and these did not go together, but they were efficient with each.” Jack sees the professor again as Froelich raises two fingers consecutively. “Erste: to produce the weapons. Zweite: to kill the workers, ja.”
“Henry—”
“When I arrive to Dora from the other place—”
“What other place?”
“From Auschwitz Drei—Auschwitz Three, ja? I am not so strong but I have learned to say ‘electrical mechanic’ and so I do not die with carrying the skin, the shell of the rocket, how you say?”
“Casings.”
He is speaking quickly now. “I am fortunate also because I have not terrible dysentery, only somewhat, but there are many children and they take them away and beat them to death. I am lucky because I have not marched all of the way from Auschwitz to Dora, I have been on a railway Wagen, it is open, no roof. This is good because it is winter and I drink the snow from my shoulders, you see? Also I can breathe. I do not freeze because many die around me so I crawl beneath their bodies. I am thin but when I arrive to Dora I am fortunate, I do not build my barracks, others must do this and many die.”
The word “Auschwitz” sizzles like acid in the air around Jack. His home is across the street. His bed. His children in their beds. His wife. He feels heat on his face, but it is not comforting. He is too close to something. He should move back, but he cannot.
“We sing for the guards.”
“What?”
“It is winter and I do not know the date, only that it snows and they make us to sing ‘Stille Nacht.’”
“‘Silent Night.’”
“So I know this is December 1944.”
Froelich tears off a piece of bread and feeds it to the dog, whose black nose glistens just below table level. A new layer is unfolding in Jack’s mind. Fried worked in a criminal place, so it follows that Froelich would associate his face with brutality, but it does not necessarily follow that Fried personally committed crimes. Still, he must have known about the hangings. Does Simon know? I cleared him for security myself. “So he was a scientist.”
“Who?”
“This fella you saw, the man from Dora.”
“A scientist? He was just an engineer. Es macht nichts. He is a criminal.”
“Are you saying he was a — what? SS?”
“I never saw a uniform at Dora,” says Froelich. “Only the guards wear uniforms. Von Braun does not wear his uniform.”
“Von Braun?”
“Ja, he visits his rocket.”
“Von Braun was SS?”
“Natürlich. But the other one, always brown wool.”
“What?”
“The engineer — he wears always a suit of brown wool. And small glasses, round like pebbles. No face — I mean to say, no expression. His eyes do not change, his voice does not change, always quiet. With him, alles ist normal. This is what I remember.” He pushes his bowl away and sits back. “An ordinary man.”
Jack sips in order to wet his lips; they have gone dry.
Froelich continues, “Except for his flower. It was rare. It grows in the tunnel.” He shakes his head. “People are not boring, Jack, do you agree?”
“What did he do, Henry?”
“He was an engineer in the tunnels.”
“No, I mean, what did—?”
“He saw over production in his sector. He hated to see his rocket to be built by us. We were scarecrows. He looks for sabotage. He finds a great deal. He wishes to impress his superiors, verstehen?”
Jack leans forward. “What was his crime?”
Froelich likewise leans forward. “You know how many people are killed by the V-2?”
“No, I don’t,” says Jack. Their faces are only a foot or so apart.
“Five thousand.” Froelich drops his palm to the table with a smack. Jack doesn’t move. “Do you know how many die of building this rocket that is so fascinating you, Jack? Mehr als—more than twenty thousand.” The palm slams down again and the empty glasses jump.
The dog barks, the back door opens and Madeleine’s little friend comes in.
“Colleen, Schatzi, hier zu Papa, bitte komm.” The girl goes to him and he hugs her, stroking her rough hair. The narrow blue eyes stare at Jack over Froelich’s shoulder.
“Hello, Colleen,” says Jack. The child doesn’t answer. Jack notices a faint scar at the corner of her mouth.
Froelich fills a bowl for her and she takes it from the room. The dog follows. After a moment, music comes from the hi-fi — a woman singing “Mack the Knife” in German.
“In the camps, I am not so young and strong but I know something. If you help another to survive, maybe you also survive. At Auschwitz, I take a boy’s glasses when we are pulled from the train. There are dogs and lights and music very loud, and screaming of guards, all to confuse, but underneath is very organized, you can see this if you are not so terrified, and I am lucky, I am not so afraid because I know my wife is safe. Also”—he looks at Jack as though imparting a secret—“I have a trick. I imagine that I have lived before these experiences.”
Froelich looks expectant so Jack nods.
“This boy,” continues Froelich. “A student, probably — I knock his glasses down and I tell him what to say, ‘electrical mechanic.’ They push him to the right. To right is work. To left is death. I have already been from Bühne so I know. Perhaps he has survived.” Froelich closes his eyes. “Also, I do not realize the bombing until after the war, so this also helps me.”