Arnost Lustig - Lovely Green Eyes

Ever since she was eleven she had known that life was not as simple as she would like. It was a mysterious ocean, with shallows and depths, calm and treacherous; with currents and whirlpools, generally indifferent to the fate of girls like her. She recalled how at home she used to look forward to winter, to spring, to waking up in the morning.

“Sometimes they let you choose, but mostly they do the choosing.”

“In Japan ‘menstruation’ is a taboo word,” she said.

“We must try,” Madam Kulikowa said at breakfast. They had finger-thick chunks of army bread with thin strawberry jam made from potatoes, as well as a frozen jacket potato. They were drinking coffee made from roasted acorns. They had been sweeping the snow in the yard since five in the morning.

“Why?” asked Smartie, swallowing a piece of chewed potato skin.

“That’s life,” replied the Madam. “You go through doors which are forever being closed.”

She had a homily for them every morning. The notion of a door being slammed shut in someone’s face if she hadn’t put her foot against it and pushed with all her strength was one of these. The girls gulped the hot brownish-black liquid to get warm. Soon they would go to the latrine, into the tub, and to their cubicles. The Madam had other favourite adages: Number one: When a cockerel arrives he wants a hen. Number two: Even a gold ducat passes from hand to hand. Number three: A proper girl can handle a drunkard and a brawler. And: A wise girl does not complain.

The sun was not out for long. The sky clouded over and it began to snow. The wind sprang up.

Later, while they were clearing the snow, the army radio operator found some music — the Peter Kreuder Ensemble. On German forces radio, the war seemed a cheerful business, in dance rhythm.

Twelve: Valhardt Wolf, Stefan Gunther, Alois Merinda, Michael Brunner, Julius Pfeiffer, Franz Kowacz, Herbert Pox, Paul William Wechsler, Juraj Klokocznick, Fred Robert Glas, Franz Grub er, Adalbert von Abele.

That evening, Long-Legs was bleeding from her bottom.

“I’m like a sewer,” she said.

She hadn’t been able to see her way back from the latrine. The Oberführer had ordered the fuses to be taken out. There was no light in the dormitory. A single oil lamp was flickering in the corridor, but the wick was low and the flame nearly out. In Long-Leg’s eyes there was no pride, only contempt and possibly hatred. Everyone knew she would not see the doctor. Instead of treating her, the Oberführer would send her straight to Festung Breslau. There was lethargy and weariness in her eyes.

“They’ve turned us into whores.”

They could hear the Oberführer outside in the corridor. He was instructing Big Leopolda Kulikowa to save water. The water tanker had not arrived.

“The pure race,” Long-Legs grimaced.

She kept her pain to herself. Wouldn’t it be better not to live? Was her soul shrivelling like a wilting flower? She was still bleeding.

“I have no soul. It’s my bottom that’s bleeding.”

Skinny was ashamed to look away. She was glad it was dark. She gave Long-Legs her cotton wool, and two sticking plasters. Long-Legs put a sand-filled pillow under her behind, but that was uncomfortable.

Beautiful also gave Long-Legs her cotton wool.

“I hope this won’t happen to you,” Long-Legs said.

“I hope so too,” said Skinny.

“He flung the S S Guidance Brochure Number 17 on my bed, saying it was good reading material.”

“What’s wrong with you?” she asked Skinny.

“I’ve got goose-bumps all of a sudden.” Skinny said.

“He rolled on the floor with me,” Long-Legs said. “He didn’t like the smell of the bed.”

They heard a noise outside as a truck arrived from the Wehrkreis with two crates labelled Schutzgummi , rubber sheaths.

Long-Legs said she was afraid of dogs. While she was in the latrine she’d overheard the handler of thirteen German Shepherds from the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, delivered by a Czech police officer, explain to the Oberführer and commander of the brothel that somewhere near Prague dogs were now being trained to obey German commands. These dogs were a super-breed — their jawbones had a strength equal to the pressure of 1,000 to 5,000 pounds per square inch. Their bite left a deep wound — a hole where the flesh had been torn out, extremely painful even when a scab had grown over it — and caused damage to the nerves. The dogs could tear an eye from its socket, along with a chunk of face.

“Beauties,” the Oberführer had said appreciatively. The new dogs had the strength of wolves. They were to be fed pork and beef, as well as offal.

Long-Legs learned too, that, faced with an enraged animal, she had to stand motionless like a tree on a windless day. An animal should not be annoyed while it was feeding or nursing its pups. The main thing was not to shout, or to stare into the dog’s eyes.

Things had happened fast in that part of Poland by the River San. The Germans had been retreating, like a ram lowering its head in resistance while edging backwards on its four legs. They were defending every inch of foreign soil as though it were theirs. The brothel was evacuated and Skinny escaped from the marching column. She was saved by the confusion that swept Poland and soon also Germany, creating a level of disorganization never previously experienced in Europe. She lied, she changed her identity, she stole when she had to. She let herself be hired for work in a laundry with the help of a Polish girl to whom she promised half her wages. Then the Polish girl disappeared, but not before she had obtained papers for Skinny that said in effect that her identity could not be established. She could pretend to be a deportee, and she received a work permit and an identity card. There were about 100 women working at the laundry. Katowice was quite close and she went there several times with the girls, once even for a dance. She also helped out in a kitchen at the railway station. After a long, dreadful time she ate her fill nearly every day.

I had not seen Skinny since September. I found her again in Prague about three months after the end of the war. It was a hot August; the days were close, with sudden brief thunderstorms. She attracted me with something that I probably would not have liked in another girl. I sensed right from our first meeting in Prague that there was in her something she didn’t wish to talk about and which I should not even wish to know. But, as is natural, this made me even more curious. And the more curious I was the more reticent she became.

Some people in Prague were told they should not have come back but stayed where they were. One of them jumped out of a window. He had been a machine gunner in the eastern army. Two of his brothers were killed and he had lost his father, his mother and three children. His heavy Maxim gun, so recently effective against the Germans, didn’t help him with peacetime. He wrote a farewell note that was published in the Bulletin of the Jewish Communities; they printed it on the last page.

Skinny thought it odd that there could be anti-Semitism when there were so few Jews left. It was rumoured that nine-tenths of them been killed. Suddenly we realized that one could survive the war and be defeated after it. But that, our mutual friend Ervin Adler argued, was not our affair. Could the echo be stronger than what had produced it?

While in the camps, we had idealized the outside world, not realizing that it didn’t give a damn about us. Between us and them were invisible shadows, fences and barriers. Some of the walls were high and thick; getting over was not easy. For a while we each remained behind our walls, peeping at one another over the top. Adler had met an elderly gentleman in the park who, after gazing at him for a long time, eventually summoned the courage to ask him whether, by any chance, he had also come back from a concentration camp. Before Adler could even reply the man said, “I do apologize.”