Free The Nazi Officer's Wife by Edith H. Beer Page A

Britain, a clear indication that Mussolini thought Hitler would win the war, I took the pills of my own volition, for I felt now that all was lost. We were trapped in the fascist empire.
    Pepi refused to despair. His punctuality regulated and calmed our lives. His small gifts from the Aryan side—coffee, cheese, books—reminded us of better days gone by. And then, in an unforgettable act of romantic abandon, he pressured his mother into giving him some money, and he took me to the Vachau.
    We had three glorious days in a fairy-tale wonderland. We floated on the crystal blue river. We climbed up to the ruin of the Durenstein castle, where Richard the Lionhearted was held prisoner and Blondl the troubadour sang of his escape. We locked the door of our hotel room and fell on the bed and rolled in each other’s arms. People would ask me why I had married a man so much older than I, for Pepi looked old for his age and I looked young for mine. I said: “Because he is the world’s greatest lover!”
    The Nazis vanished like evil dwarfs under a magic spell. We wandered along the charming paths where Bertrand Russell had walked before us, pronouncing this place the enchanted garden of Austria, and we knew nothing but our delight in each other. Politics, poverty, terror, and hysteria all disappeared into the thin sharp mountain air.
    “You are my angel,” he whispered. “You are my magic little mouse, my darling girl …”
    That was the only reason I stayed in Austria, you see. I was in love, and I couldn’t imagine life without my Pepi.
     
    W HEN ABOUT 100,000 of the 185,000 Viennese Jews had somehow made their way out, the Nazis decided that all otherJews remaining in Vienna had to be registered, so we were forced at gunpoint to line up in the square. All the F’s had to appear on one day, all the G’s on another day, and all the H’s on April 24, 1941. Mama and I stood in line from early morning on. When people fainted, we helped to pick them up and tried to carry them out of the sun. A unit of Gestapo men cruised by in a truck. One of them jumped out and yanked at my mother and me.
    “Get in the truck,” he said.
    “What? Why?”
    “Don’t ask stupid questions, you Yid bitch, get in!”
    We were pushed up into the truck. I held Mama’s hand tight. They took us to an SS office and put a paper in front of us.
    “You are both needed for agricultural work in the Reich. Here. Sign this. It’s a contract.”
    Instantly, my training as a lawyer came flooding back. I turned into a litigator. I argued as though I were inventing the art of argument.
    “But this woman should not even be here,” I said, pushing Mama behind me. “She’s not a Viennese, she’s not a Jew, she’s just an old maid we once employed, who was visiting and decided to keep me company.” “Sign the paper.”
    “Besides, look at her! She can’t possibly be any good for work. She has bone spurs in her feet, arthritis in her hips. She’s an orthopedic mess, I tell you. If you need workers, go find my sisters. My sister Gretchen is beautiful, only twenty-two years old, and an athlete. Yes sir, the best! If she hadn’t been Jewish, she would have been on the Olympic girls’ swimming team. And my sister Erika is as strong as two horses. You’ll be able to hitch her to a plow, I tell you. They’re both back in that line; you must have missed them. How could you miss two such strong and robust youngwomen and seize upon this old crone? Is there something wrong with your eyes? Perhaps you need an exam …”
    “All right, all right, shut up!” the Nazi yelled. “Let the old woman go. Go, go, Mother, get out of here!” They pushed Mama into the sunny street.
    I signed their paper. It was a contract obligating me to spend six weeks doing farmwork in the north of Germany. If I didn’t show up at the train station tomorrow, the paper said, I would be treated as a wanted criminal and hunted down without mercy.
    My mother and I slept in each