(April 1943)
“Are you lying to me, Schisser?” Lieutenant Becker’s hand squeezes Victor’s cheeks, pulling his head to look at him.
“Ne-nein! Nein, Herr!” Victor squeaks through the fingers clenching his mouth.
Becker drops Victor’s head, and turns to the other man they brought in, standing, trembling by the door, wringing a dirty cap in his hands.
“Are you lying to me, Franzose?” his voice threateningly low.
“Non, nein… I, I am not, sir. This is the man I was talking about, he… he was asking questions, I… I told the Offizier. I was worried, you see, it’s not… people just don’t ask questions. No-Nobody…”
“He is lying, Herr, please! I have never seen…”
“Schweig!” Becker roars, and silence collapses on to the room, pushing all the air out of it.
Becker’s slow pacing is the first sound that enters the space again, and somehow, the man’s steady steps back and forth are more terrifying than his raging.
Victor is so aware of his burning ears, they feel foreign on his head. At the thought of enduring another beating, tears spring to his eyes. He refuses to release them, refuses to cry in front of this monster and his snitch.
“We will try this again. You,” the lieutenant finally points at Victor, “are telling me you weren’t at Katowice asking questions. He,” pointing to the Frenchman, “says you were wandering around Katowice, asking questions about our facility in Auschwitz. Now,” Becker stands still between the two men, “I’ll give you both a chance to get the story straight. If I’m not satisfied with the result of this little… competition, you’ll both get punished.” The warning lingers as a promise in the air.
“Du,” Becker points at Victor, “start.”
#
(October 1942)
Victor had never heard of Gerth Jospa before their meeting in Brussels in October. Hadn’t it been for the war and the events that unfolded under the German occupation, they would have never crossed paths.
Victor had joined Le Front de l’independence, a resistance group that had formed in Brussels, two years after the Germans had invaded Belgium, and two years after he’d lost his Marie to their bombs. It had taken him that time to learn to live life without her, and then to fill the void she had left with the determination to not let her death be in vain.
Gerth was the founder of the Comité des Défenses des Juifs, established only a month earlier in an underground reaction to the actions against Jews that had transpired since May. It had started with the pamphlets, glued on walls, calling Jews to wear the Star of David. Eventually, they were put on strict curfews, they were fired from public positions, their businesses were closed and their kids were banned from schools. Then in August, the call came for Jews to leave their houses and register at the Dossin Baracks in Mechelen. The former army base, now SS-Sammellager Mecheln, was situated right in the middle between Brussels and Anwerp, the cities with the largest Jewish communities in Belgium, and from its station, the deportations had started.
“We have no idea where these poor souls are being transported to,” Ghert had whispered. He had been forced to stop working as an accountant, and now used his talent for problem solving and analytical thinking to serve the people most under threat.
“Nobody has gotten any word from the people who left. It’s like they’ve vanished.”
“They’re probably taking them to work camps,” Victor had tried to reassure Gerth. The Germans were in dire need of work force. They’d just announced the Arbeitseinsatz, the mandatory employment in Germany of all Belgian men between 18 and 50.
“There are rumors,” Ghert had pressed, “disturbing rumors, about a town in Poland, Auschwitz. They say people are systematically massacred there, while men are put to labor until they die of exhaustion.”
Victor had thought for a second. Surely, such rumors had to be gravely exaggerated. But he wanted to be of service to the resistance and his vow to Le Front. He knew this role and its mission were perfect for him: having studied Sociology in Germany, he not only had connections there, he spoke the language fluently.
“I’ll go,” Victor had said.
#
(February 1943)
Obtaining the passport and travel documents went smoother than they had anticipated. Victor wrote to his former professor Liebmann in Cologne, Germany, explaining he was working on a study about behavioral differences between social classes, and could they perhaps arrange for Victor to visit him at the university?
Liebmann responded with a letter of recommendation for the German administration. The Germans found no danger or threat in sociologic research, and his passport and paperwork were issued without much question.
Victor had left Brussels on February 4th, to spend a week in Cologne, where he met with colleagues Liebmann recommended he’d see for his research. He made sure to keep his diary and notes meticulously in order, just in case. The next leg of the trip would be harder, but it was his old professor who provided him with the ticket to Poland.
“You should talk to Professor Maczek at the University of Breslau,” Liebmann had suggested, “his findings and publications on class differences are exactly what your study needs.”
It had taken a day to get permission to travel to Poland.
Once there, Victor started taking risks, and steered off of his approved travel program, visiting towns on the perimeter of Auschwitz, looking for people to talk to. In the ghetto of Sosnowiec, someone connected him with a fellow Belgian. René had volunteered to the German employment call. Now hospitalized with pneumonia, the man had worked in Auschwitz.
“Yes,” René had confirmed, “the convoys coming from Mechelen arrive at Auschwitz.”
“When they arrive, the SS guards are waiting for them, with dogs. They split them in two groups. Yelling, so much yelling. The dogs bark. The kids cry…” René had stared at the ceiling, “the sick, the disabled, the elderly, they are taken. Anyone who shows any sign of weakness, who’s not… valuable, not at least able to work for however long they need them to, is taken away. They are never seen again.”
“Are you sure? Maybe they’re taking them elsewhere? A different camp?”
“The trains leaving Auschwitz, are empty, my friend.” René then turned his head to Victor, his eyes glistening with the truth his words held.
#
(April 1943)
Victor takes a shaky breath. He tastes blood on his tongue. His heartbeat pulsates in the swelling of his right eye.
“I travelled from Cologne to Berslau, as my paperwork shows, for research. I met with Professor Maczek. Professor Wójcik. Professor Zieliński. I spent most of my time at the university library. I have never been to Katowice. The notes on my conversations and studies are in my suitcase. I’m certain if you contact any of the professors…”
“Hmm, enough,” Becker’s hand flicks an annoyed wave, “You. Next,” he turns to the Frenchman.
“There was a man. In Katowice. That’s near Auschwitz, Herr, I work there… I volunteered, Herr, to come work in Poland, for you, for Germany... My friends, they talked to him at the café – I was there. I saw them. The man, he asked… about Auschwitz. They, they took him. A friend – no, not a friend, an acquaintance. An acquaintance took him, the man, to Auschwitz. The man asked a lot of questions, about the operations and the working of the camp…”
“See, to us, Meine Herren, that sounds like “the man” was spying on our Reich. That concerns us.” Becker paces the room again. “So, what I need to know, Franzose, is this: is this “the man”?” He pulls Victor by the hair on the back of his head.
“Look at him!” Becker yells. Victor whimpers. The Frenchman shakes violently.
“I’m… I’m so sorry, Monsieur… I’m not entirely certain now…”
“You’re not entirely certain? He has a pretty distinct face, with those giant ears, wouldn’t you say? A bit like… a mousse, with those eyes so close? Not a face you easily forget?”
“I… I wouldn’t know, sir.”
Becker lets go of his grip, rubs his hand on his trousers, as if he just touched filth.
“Were you with this “acquaintance” who took “the man” to the camp?
“No-no… sir. I wasn’t. Maybe that’s why, you see. Maybe… the café, it was dark, you know. And… and I had a beer. I am not entirely certain this is the man, sir.”
Becker looks from one man to the other. Thinking. Mulling. Analyzing. Deciding.
“You two are boring me with your stories,” Becker sighs as he walks to the door.
“Take him,” he instructs an officer standing in the hallway, “but leave the Belgien here. I’m not done with him.”
Victor’s body reacts to the words and the threat they hold. Adrenaline rushes like a red alert through his veins. Sticktothestorysticktothestorysticktotheystory, his mind wills him.
Victor’s mission got him exactly what he came for, and maybe even more than he bargained for. Definitely more than his heart could carry, which made it easier to bury the information, make it sink to the bottom of his brain and pretend it wasn’t there. Not that he wanted to hold on to this secret. He wished desperately he’d be able to share his story with those who were waiting to hear it. But that may no longer be in his cards, and as long as he’s in the hands of these German Schweins, he’ll have to keep their darkness from rolling off his tongue.
#
(February 1943)
Victor’s quest had ended right there. René had confirmed everything they needed to know back home. But he was so close, and the account was of such horrific magnitude, he needed to see the truth for himself.
His host lend him a bike, and he biked the 30 minutes to Katowice, right near the perimeter of Auschwitz III.
The café had been dimly lit. Victor had been unaware that in the shadows, someone would deem his curiosity profitable.
It had taken a round to loosen the tongues and release his questions. Maurice had been eager to talk. He’d left France, he said, because there had been no jobs. Him and his friends had volunteered when the Germans called for manpower.
The men moved freely in and around the camp, but spent their nights at Katowice, “although you can never escape the smoke,” Maurice had said.
“The smoke?” Victor had asked. And Maurice had ushered him outside. When they’d walked a couple of blocks, Maurice pointed in the distance.
“You see that chimney? It spits smoke all day, every day, around the clock. Hasn’t stopped since they started using it earlier this year.”
Victor stood quiet.
“The ovens there have a capacity of hundreds a day. There are not that many people who die of disease or starvation every day, mon ami. Not unless you make them.”
Victor’s throat had gone so dry it hurt swallowing. The sickening taste of the air gripped at his stomach. He turned away as he got sick.
#
(May 1943)
Victor hadn’t joined the resistance because he wanted to fight. He was not built to fight – that’s why he’d enrolled at the University of Leuven when the war had started: to escape the fight, the army, death.
It had come for him anyway. He could see the irony in his cowardice. Marie had been killed by the German bombs the first night they attacked and invaded Belgium on its South border.
He had joined the resistance because he wanted revenge and justice. And because he understood that a fight wasn’t merely physical.
He started to infiltrate parties of collaborators with aliases that changed him from an economist to an architect or lawyer, whatever needed. He coaxed information out of generals and soldiers, which then got published and spread in clandestine print. It was dangerous, but it hadn’t felt life-threatening. Not until the Gestapo had lifted him out of his bed in Breslau. Not until he was at the mercy of Lieutenant Becker.
He’d been imprisoned for over a month when Becker had grown tired of interrogating him and confronting him with the French snitch who’d reeled his accusations in each time he’d faced Victor’s beaten and bruised face.
There was no substantial evidence of Victor being near Auschwitz, no other witnesses – or at least none prepared to talk. But Becker hadn’t been able to shake the suspicion of having an industrial spy on his hands.
“You will work for us,” Becker had thrown the small suitcase Victor had brought for what was supposed to be a two-week journey at his feet, “until the war is over.”
And since that end was not in sight, Victor decided escaping was his only option.
#
Eight days after he was taken to Radwic concentration camp, Victor took the little money he had been paid for his new job as an interpreter, and walked to the nearest station. Nobody had tried to stop him.
At the Belgian border – where he grew up as a young boy – he hiked through the forests until he’d crossed the frontline. His escape had been as effortless and undisturbed as his departure nearly three months earlier.
Although it was still in hiding and it still needed safe-keeping: the most important thing about coming home was his chance to share the truth he’d buried deep.
#
“All this time, I never stopped hoping they were… necessary. Useful,” Gerth was the first one who spoke. The man stared at his hands folded on the table. Gerth had kept track of the convoys. Twenty trains, nearly twenty-thousand people, had been deported by then.
“These are my people, monsieur Victor. I am one of them. The difference, the reason why I am alive and here today, is because I refuse to yield to them.” Gerth’s voice rose with every word.
“Le Front stands with you, Gerth. Whatever it takes, whatever we can do.”
“Yes. We need to save as many as we can.” Gerth whispered.
Victor looked around the bare backroom in the house they used for these undercover meetings, the windows taped with yellowed newspapers, unreadable articles and faded pictures. News from a lifetime ago, the “before” that would be overshadowed in history by this present time. The “before” where he had been a sociology student and Marie was to become his wife. Where Gerth Jospa was an accountant who noted numbers in ledgers and not the names of the Jewish children he placed with Flemish and Walloon families, hiding them in plain sight, until the war was over.
Victor’s report was published in the clandestine press and spread amongst the resistance, who moved to save over three-thousand children and many others.
Victor never spoke about his mission, what he witnessed and endured, again.
#
(Historical Fiction - based on the untold story of Victor Martin (1912-1989))