Page 92 of Hell to Pay
There was a feeling like a hole in my stomach. “Let me think,” I said. “Let me talk to Dr. Becker, too. We’ll find an answer.”
“You said he could find work,” she said, “and what has he found? A few patients, certainly, but they hardly pay. And the heirloom …”
“You’re right,” I said. “I should have been more attentive to the problem. Let me see what I can do.”
Dr. Becker, when I told him, looked startled, then sad. “Where can we go?” he asked helplessly.
“There are Americans in Nuremberg,” I said. “Official ones, doing official things.”
“Doingwhatofficial things?”
“I don’t know, but we can find out. The train’s running now, and we can?—”
He said heavily, “I have no money for the train.”
“I still have a few marks.” Frau Adelberg paid me a little, but it was averylittle. Otherwise, all the money the bakery took in went for food and other necessities—whatever we could get. Toilet paper was nonexistent now; we used newspapers, which were limited by law to two pages due to the paper shortage. Before the surrender, that had been about all those newspapers were good for, and it wasn’t much different now. I said, “Let’s go see what the Americans say, anyway. It can’t hurt to ask, and I can translate for you.”
“All right.” He stood with more decision than he’d shown recently. “I have another idea, too. It’s time to try it.”
Once I’d finished my baking the next morning, we did take the train, covering the five miles that had taken us so many hours to walk in a mere fifteen minutes, even with all the train’s bewildering stops and starts. The station in Nuremberg didn’t look much better than it had six weeks ago, but the streets were perhaps less filled with rubble. I asked passers-by where to find the Americans, and eventually, a man told me, “They’ve set up shop in the Palace of Justice. But you’ll have to queue outside.”
He was correct. A roped-off area contained dozens of citizens, all queueing patiently as they’d queued throughout the war. We may or may not have been the most skilled at fighting, but we were certainly the European champions at queueing! At the front, facing them, stood a tall, broad man in a U.S. Army uniform, with the letters “M.P.” on his armband. I wondered how much he ate to remain so stocky.
The day was warm—it was nearly June—and we soon grew hot as we waited. An hour later, we’d advanced perhaps a quarter of the way. A man came out of the building andcalled in German, “All those who need bicycle permits, you must go see the German authorities!”
“They sent us here!” a woman called back.
“I can’t help you,” he said. “We have nothing to do with bicycles.”
About half the group left, though with much grumbling, so that looked more hopeful for us. After another hour, though, we seemed to be at a standstill. People still came in and out of the doors of the grand old building, which had somehow not been destroyed in the raids, and the big soldier was replaced by a medium-sized one, but our queue wasn’t moving. “They’ve probably all gone to lunch,” Dr. Becker said. “Listen—I have an idea. You stay here and hold our place. I have another errand that may be more helpful.” He looked excited, though I couldn’t imagine why. He was in his shabby old suit, the only one he owned, but had worn a tie with it today. He must be very hot, but in his green tie and Homburg hat, freshly shaved and with a shine on my father’s good black shoes, he was really quite smart.
“Very well,” I said. “But try not to be too long. It would be just our luck if the queue started moving like mad and you weren’t here!”
He was gone about an hour and a half, and by the time he returned, I was only four people back in the queue and starting to worry that we’d miss our chance. I could see his dejection from a hundred yards away. It was the droop of his shoulders and the heaviness of his walk. A pair of women at the front of the queue were allowed into the building at that moment, and now I was only two people back. I was also a little faint with heat and had drunk every drop of the flask of water I’d brought in my rucksack, but surely we’d be allowed inside soon.
Dr. Becker threaded his way through the crowd and come to join me, to the accompaniment of some audible mutteringabout queue-jumping. When he didn’t say anything, I asked, “What happened?”
I’d never seen him look truly defeated, but he looked that way now. “I went to the hospital,” he said, “and spoke to the administrator there. He isn’t wearing his Party button anymore, of course, but oh, yes, he was a Nazi, and still is, in his heart. Do these Americans see nothing?”
I was beginning to get a glimmer. “And?”
He sighed. “I asked about getting work there. They’re clearly overcrowded and understaffed, as one would have guessed. How many doctors have even returned from their Army duties yet? And with all the injuries from bombings and street combat … I used my realKennkarte,of course, and gave my credentials—they have a burn ward here, and it’s more than full up—but he looked at me as if considering stepping on a cockroach, if only it wouldn’t dirty his shoe. He said …” Dr. Becker swallowed. “That he thought Hitler’d made it clear that Germany was no place for Jews. He told me to go see the ‘Jew-loving Americans,’ that they were sure to have reserved the place of honor for me.”
“He didn’twantyou?” I asked, furious and incredulous by turns. “With all your skill?”
Dr. Becker shook his head. “I recognized his name, and his fat, smug face, too. I met him at a medical meeting, it must have been twelve or more years ago. He came to a talk I gave and spoke to me afterward. I found his knowledge wanting and his arrogance insulting. And this—this!—is the man who turns me down as of no use!”
I was glad he was angry. Anger was surely better than defeat. I was searching for a way to answer when the American soldier said, “Next?” A word that is nearly the same in English and German.
I stepped forward, heart beating hard—surely there would be something for us here!—and said, “I’m here with my friend,interpreting for him. He needs a place to live for him and his children, and—and food assistance, or?—”
The soldier said, “Everybody needs a place to live. How could we possibly take care of all of them? He’ll have to take his chances with the others. Next time, don’t start a war you can’t win.” He sounded bored, and was already scanning the people in the queue behind us.
“Wait!” I said in desperation. “Wait. He’s a doctor—a very fine doctor—and a Jew. He was dreadfully persecuted—marked for transportation to Theresienstadt with his young children when we were bombed in Dresden. That was how they escaped—the bombing, because nothing worked after that. But he’s fled with nothing and been hiding ever since, and?—”
“A Jew?” The soldier looked skeptical. “I haven’t seen a Jew here yet. I’ve seen a lot of people who say theyhelpedJews, but?—”
I translated, and Dr. Becker, with immense dignity, held up hisKennkarte—the original one. A little battered now, as it had lived for months in my shoe. He said, “Now you’ve seen one.”
