Ben Elton - Two Brothers

The American was led protesting from the scene, the civilian who had arrived in the same car as the Gestapo man following him, already firing off a series of rapid excuses and qualifications.

‘Jewish provocation,’ the man from the Propaganda Ministry could be heard saying. ‘An essential containment action in order to maintain public order… Jews required to clean up results of their own vandalism.’

The Gestapo officer turned back to the Fischers.

‘So, you will now get inside your shop,’ he said.

‘Sir,’ Herr Fischer began, ‘you are clearly a policeman. These troopers have acted illegally. The boycott is voluntary…’

‘Herr Fischer.’ The Gestapo man spoke quietly now. Leaning forward, bringing his face quite close to Fischer’s, conveying more menace than ever mere shouting would have done. ‘You have been given an order by an officer of the Prussian Political Police. I suggest you follow it immediately. Otherwise I will have you arrested for a breach of public order and, believe me, you do not wish these men to take you into their custody. Now, Jew, take your Jew wife and get inside your Jew shop.’

Frau Fischer tugged gently at her husband’s arm.

‘Come, Isaac,’ she croaked, ‘please, they are releasing us. And I must have water.’

Herr Fischer made a small bow, then taking his wife’s hand turned away from his tormentor. With stumbling step and aching knees weakened by their ordeal on the pavement, they made their way towards the multiple glass-front doors of their store.

It was 9.05.

Thirty-five minutes late.

Thirty-five minutes later than the Fischer department store had ever been opened in all its history.

The doors swung open as the Fischers approached them.

Shocked, white faces awaited them, cowering behind the glass. Such familiar faces, made strange with fear.

The doorman.

A store detective.

The senior under-manager, due to retire in only two weeks’ time after forty years of service. His gift was already at the engraver’s.

All the Jewish members of the Fischer’s staff were there. Making do to cover the numerous tills, waiting behind their counters, as they had all been waiting since 8.15 that morning, in theoretical anticipation of a visit from the Empress Augusta Viktoria.

Lovely young people. Fine, upstanding young people. Smartly turned out in their matching outfits. The girls with little caps that Frau Fischer had designed herself.

But no customers. A ghost shop. Silent during business hours for the first time in its history.

The beautiful, sparkling, tastefully sumptuous store was like a film set just before the extras were ordered to their places. As if some unseen director was about to shout ‘action’ and flood the aisles and counters with hundreds of eager shoppers.

Herr Fischer attempted to smile and even found his voice, or at least a croaking semblance of it.

‘Thank you all for coming,’ he said. ‘I hope that you will stay at your positions in expectation of later trade.’

Then, still holding his wife’s hand, he began to make his way across the floor.

Some of the girls gave way to tears as the injured couple passed. The young men too looked shaken and close to breaking. The Fischers seemed to notice this and attempted to hold their heads up a little, giving a small nod or the hint of a smile to various of the longer-serving employees.

On they walked through the tension and the silence. Their footsteps ringing on the polished marble floor. The sole sound in that great and splendid room.

Past porcelain and china. Perfumery.

Cosmetics. Small leather goods. Luggage. Stationery. Sticks, canes and umbrellas.

Through the glass central arcade where stood the food hall and restaurant. The very Konditorei from which Dagmar had chosen her chocolate cake to take to the Stengels, seven years before, and again just weeks ago on their birthday.

Past the famous escalators. Those mighty moving stairways which all Berlin had marvelled at and admired when the old Herr Fischer had installed them. Which Crown Prince Willy himself had opened and which every day since had thronged with shoppers, but which were empty now.

Empty but running.

Making their rumbling, vacant progress, up and down, up and down from 8.30 till 6.00, with only ghosts to ride them.

Finally Herr and Frau Fischer arrived at the elevators in the far wall of the building.

Herr Fischer turned to his wife, addressing her for the first time since they had been assaulted. ‘We must go to the office and begin telephoning, my dear. We must find Dagmar.’

‘Begging your pardon, Herr Fischer,’ the under-manager interjected softly, ‘but Fräulein Fischer was seen by the staff members who were assembled at the south doors. She’d been running from the disgraceful scene at the main entrance when she once more found herself in the grip of those villains. However, it seems that two boys got her away. Only young lads but somehow they were able to extricate the Fräulein from the Sturmabteilung and get her on to an east-bound street car, sir.’

‘Ah,’ Herr Fischer nodded and it seemed as if the ghost of a smile might be playing on his scabbed and bloodied lips, ‘then, my dear, I think we may know where she is gone.’

That night, alone in their bedroom, Paulus and Otto made a pact.

They swore to themselves and to each other that no matter what happened, no matter what Hitler tried to do to them, they would protect Dagmar.

It would be their mission in life.

They would be her brave knights in shining armour, she their damsel in distress.

Their own lives meant nothing, their only value was that they be placed in the service of the girl they loved. Somehow or other the Stengel boys would protect their princess and see that she survived this fire-breathing dragon which threatened to devour them all.

Hitler wouldn’t get her.

They would be her shield.

STONE TURNED OFF the gas beneath the kettle and made a pot of tea.

He lit the grill for toast and went into the living room to gather up his law books.

The following summer he would be taking his Bar exams via correspondence course. It would be his third attempt to pass but recently he had been ignoring his studies. The letter which purported to have come from Dagmar had chased such things from his mind. Taking his tea and toast, Stone spread the books across the kitchen table and tried to focus.

The words swam before his eyes: torts, jurisprudence, criminal, civil, family, property, commercial .

Amazing how much law it took to run a civilized country.

Hitler had always despised the law. And lawyers too.

Stone swore he would be a lawyer yet.

MIDWAY THROUGH THE first of the thousand summers that Adolf Hitler had planned for his Reich, the Stengel family were breathing a sigh of relief. Tentative and highly qualified, but relief nonetheless.

‘Basically we’re still alive,’ Wolfgang said, spreading sardines in the boys’ sandwiches for their lunch. ‘I wouldn’t have put money on that two months ago.’

‘I would, Dad,’ Otto said. He had finished his breakfast oats and was lifting dumbbells in the corner of the room as was now his regular habit, both morning and evening. ‘I’d like to see them try and kill me.’

‘They would have flipping killed you, Otts,’ Paulus said, ‘if I hadn’t told Dad what you were up to.’

‘Like a bloody snitch.’

‘Saving your life, mate,’ Paulus said, through a mouthful of porridge.

Otto did not reply, concentrating instead on curling the weights up his body, his biceps bulging under the strain.