The Girls Of Room 28_ Friendship, Hope, And Survival In Theresienstadt Part 6

Wednesday, January 5, 1944Today is my first day in the Sokolovna. I have encephalitis, or sleeping sickness, a kind of brain flu. I've been sick for ten days now and spent the whole time in sick bay. There are so many cases that one of the rooms in the Home had to be cleared to accommodate them. It was really awful there. The door wouldn't close, the windows were broken, the blinds ripped, the stove wouldn't heat, and there was a thick layer of dust everywhere. No one looked after us because it wasn't a real sick bay. It was just so that we could be isolated from the healthy children. I am so happy to be here now thick layer of dust everywhere. No one looked after us because it wasn't a real sick bay. It was just so that we could be isolated from the healthy children. I am so happy to be here now.The Sokolovna, which before the war had been the clubhouse of the Sokol (Czech for "falcon") Athletic ClubThursday, January 6, 1944The Sokolovna is a beautiful, modern building full of laboratories. The former gym is now the sick bay for all encephalitis cases. There are four rows of beds, with twenty patients in each row. Each row has its own doctor. One doctor and one nurse are on duty at night. There are five or six nurses during the day. When Pfeiffer, the head doctor, makes his rounds, he's joined by four other doctors and all the nurses.They wake us at six o'clock and take temperatures. At nine the doctor in charge makes his rounds, and at eleven the head doctor makes his. This afternoon Prof. Sittig, a nerve specialist, came to examine the new patients. We new arrivals are lying just outside the ward in a separate room with only nine beds.We are all in love with Dr. Herling, the physician a.s.signed to us, but it's hopeless because he's already married. He's so handsome and das.h.i.+ng. He has a very special smile, probably because he knows we all have a crush on him.During visiting hours today we were allowed out on the balcony and I spoke to Papa from the second floor.

The next day Helga pa.s.sed a little note to her father-let down from the terrace at the end of long thread. No visitors were allowed inside the Sokolovna, so there was always a crowd outside the building during visiting hours. Naturally, there was a loud muddle of voices, and it would have been impossible for Helga to shout everything she wanted to say to her father.

The note that Helga let down to her father on a thread from the terrace of the Sokolovna January 6, 1944Dear Papa,We're finally here. It's nice here and the main thing is: it's CLEAN CLEAN here. The girls who here. The girls who were already in the Sokolovna were so happy to see us-it's a miracle that they didn't hug us to death. We had to bathe and wash our hair. There was a concert in the evening. Someone played the violin and someone else an accordion. They played Dvoak's were already in the Sokolovna were so happy to see us-it's a miracle that they didn't hug us to death. We had to bathe and wash our hair. There was a concert in the evening. Someone played the violin and someone else an accordion. They played Dvoak's Humoresque, Poem Humoresque, Poem by Fib.i.+.c.h, a medley of songs from the operetta by Fib.i.+.c.h, a medley of songs from the operetta Gypsy Princess, Gypsy Princess, plus some Czech folk songs. They ended the concert with Gounod's plus some Czech folk songs. They ended the concert with Gounod's Ave Maria. Ave Maria.Nine o'clock is lights-out. My blanket is so heavy that I thought I'd end up flat as a pancake by morning.I'm lying next to Ruth Gutmann. She's a great girl from our room. I had already laid beside her in 17a [the sick bay at the Girls' Home] [the sick bay at the Girls' Home]. We've become fond of each other since that time. Please, write me, I'm a little afraid here. I'm reading a book in German now: The Jewish Millionaires. The Jewish Millionaires.When I look out the window I can see the Sudeten Barracks and a barbed wire fence. It looks as if I'm right at the border. Everything is covered with snow, and I can see forests and mountains in the distance. There's a guardhouse and a policeman stationed at the fence.

When Hana Lissau was discharged on January 10, Helga moved to the vacant bed beside Eva h.e.l.ler. Eva also came from Vienna and, like Helga, had been taken in 1938 to Czechoslovakia, where she lived with her aunt in Brno until her deportation. Her parents had fled to Palestine and, like Zajiek's parents, they had hoped to have their daughter follow later. But it hadn't worked out, and Eva remained with her aunt, who treated her like her own daughter.

A deep friends.h.i.+p developed between Helga and Eva h.e.l.ler. The two of them founded a "commune," shared their food and anything they got, and occasionally buried themselves in the books that were pa.s.sed around the Sokolovna: Quo Vadis, The Microbe Hunters Quo Vadis, The Microbe Hunters, and Pierrot Pierrot, Francis Kozik's biography of the French mime Caspar Debureau. Sometimes they did handicrafts with the help of a girl in a nearby bed, making little dolls out of rags, wire, and yarn. Helga gave her first creation to her father. "In case you don't recognize it, he's supposed to be a sailor, and that's an accordion he's holding." For her cousin Lea she put together a snowman, and for Trude a girl in winter clothing, in a dark blue dress with a m.u.f.f, a cap, and a scarf.

And so the days pa.s.sed with naps, chatting, reading, handicrafts, and visits by the doctors. The fears and anxieties that sometimes faded away during the day hit doubly hard at night: "Every day the actress tells me what I did in my sleep; that she tucked me in like a little child and that I scream a lot. Today I was lying with my head on Eva's stomach, and she woke up because she couldn't breathe. What's the political news? Write and tell me. I would so love to see Mama even for just a little while."

Illness still held Helga in its clutches. "I have a real encephalitis head. I forget everything. I go to the bathroom and suddenly realize I don't know why I went there. It is so bad that when I write to you and put my pencil aside for a second, I fall asleep at once. I hope that I can come home in a week or two. I couldn't write to Maenka yesterday because my eyes hurt too much."

January was drawing to a close, and there was still a blanket of snow when Helga was finally released. "Left Marta at three-thirty to see Mimi," Otto Pollak noted. "A marvelous surprise when I got to House L 410-Helga came shooting out the door. She's been released from the Sokolovna. She wanted to surprise me by playing her little trick. When I visited her yesterday she said the doctors were figuring it would be two weeks yet before the infection was gone. With a cry of Tati! Tati! she hugged me and smothered me with kisses." she hugged me and smothered me with kisses."

February 20, 1944, was, as Otto Pollak recorded enthusiastically in his diary, "the most beautiful winter day of the year. No fog, no clouds, an azure sky, cold, but with a wonderfully bright winter sun, and with freshly fallen snow thawing on Monte Terezino."1 News from the front indicated that the Germans were suffering huge losses on a daily basis. At the start of the month, according to the News from the front indicated that the Germans were suffering huge losses on a daily basis. At the start of the month, according to the bonkes bonkes making the rounds of the ghetto, fifty-four hundred airplanes were involved in a maneuver in North Africa, and the roar could be heard all across the south of France. "They were American and English planes," Helga confided to her diary in code, reversing all the letters of the sentence. making the rounds of the ghetto, fifty-four hundred airplanes were involved in a maneuver in North Africa, and the roar could be heard all across the south of France. "They were American and English planes," Helga confided to her diary in code, reversing all the letters of the sentence.

In the meantime, a new girl, Miriam Rosenzweig, had moved into Room 28. She shared a bunk with Hanka Wertheimer. The two had become acquainted in the Dresden Barracks, where Hanka's grandmother and Miriam's mother shared a room. Hanka liked this blond girl who was, like herself, a member of the Zionist organization Tekhelet-Lavan. Their pleasure in spending time together quickly grew into a friends.h.i.+p that was deepened at the meetings of Hanka's little Zionist group, Dror, which Miriam also joined.

Miriam had long been familiar with Room 28. She had regularly attended Friedl d.i.c.ker-Brandeis's painting cla.s.ses there. And she also loved to join in the girls' other activities, because there was usually something interesting going on in Room 28. The latest rage was scouting.

By this time a group of girls had joined with the boys in Room 9 to form a scouting troop. Inspired by The Boys from Beavers' River The Boys from Beavers' River, a book by Jaroslav Foglar, they called themselves the Beavers. The Beavers were divided into teams: the Wolves, the Sharpshooters, the Foxes, and the Lions, each with its own flag and battle cry. "With lionlike strength we pounce like the king of beasts. Forward, young Lions, forward, ahoy, ahoy!" was the cry of the Lions, the group that Helga had halfheartedly joined. "At first I didn't want to join the scouts," she noted, "because I know how it always turns out when our girls do anything together with these guys. Many of them don't take the whole thing seriously-they just want to be around the boys. But then I reconsidered and joined the group, because I do love nature."

When Helga heard that a couple of the girls intended to organize parties with the boys, though, she regretted her decision. "Yuck! Dancing, body against body. The smell of sweat and makeup. I'm against it. This isn't allowed according to scouting rules."

Judith Schwarzbart was in total agreement with her. Weren't there enough scouting activities-like not speaking for a day, or not eating all day, or not laughing, even when others did everything they could to make you laugh? What was all this to-do about boys? Some girls were now also suggesting ideas for future parties: a sketch, a game, something amusing. Had their comrades gone completely crazy?

Others saw the funny side of the matter. Handa and Fika used this opportunity to write what they called an "ironic song." It can be found in Handa's notebook: One day Gelbec [Honza Gelbkopf] came to us and said: "I'm supposed to tell you that our scout troop will be meeting this afternoon." He was hardly out the door when everyone began shouting, "Hurrah! There'll be lots of boys there!" Lenka: "Which blouse should I wear? This one's all wrinkled, and my best skirt has a big spot on it." "So what?" one of the girls said. "Why are you always going on about your blouse!" "Lenka, calm down. It's not important." Lenka: "But I've got to look good because my boyfriend will see me there." Another girl: "You're so silly. Gelbec isn't even your boyfriend anymore. So don't try that on us, and stop worrying about your outfit all the time."The next day the stillness of Home 9 was broken by a deep sigh. "Who would like to exchange 2 ounces of margarine for Ela? She jabbers so much I don't even like her anymore." And one of the boys says, "You don't think I'm crazy, do you? I can eat margarine. But what can I do with Ela?"Suddenly Chamiurgl's bald head comes into view. And he raises one finger and says menacingly, "Gelbec, I'm warning you. You stick with Ela, or I'll make mincemeat of you."

Although Judith and Helga both loved to laugh and were amused by such foolishness, they could not make heads or tails of the excitement this partners.h.i.+p with the boys in Home 9 was occasioning among their roommates. "For all I care this scouting thing can fall apart. It's really just silly stuff with boys, and it has no deeper meaning at all," Helga told her diary. "Ma'agal full speed ahead would be better." Or education. "I've been unfaithful to you, haven't I?" reads her entry for February 24. "But I really haven't had any time to write. I have so much to learn if I want to stay in group A. I was second in geography with a grade of 95, and in history I had a 100, and Hana Lissau and I are the best in the cla.s.s. We have a new teacher in Czech, a regular Xanthippe. She taught the eighth grade. Things are getting lost here. Tella is carrying out a search to find out why."

Something quite shocking was happening in Room 28. Bread, margarine, sugar, and even buns and dumplings kept disappearing somewhere along the way from the children's kitchen to the Home. "I'll never forget that moment," little Frta, Marta Frohlich, recalls. "I was a suspect! And then two more buns disappeared, and two girls would have to go without lunch. They searched everywhere and took my bunk apart, but didn't find anything. Then the counselors came up with a plan. Before our meal all the girls had to go down to the courtyard, and a counselor hid behind the curtain of our closet. The counselor who accompanied the girls getting the food placed the bucket in view of the hidden counselor. We were called in for our meal. And two buns were missing again. 'That just isn't possible!' I can still hear it today. And suddenly a girl pointed at me and said, 'She's blus.h.i.+ng. It's probably her.' I started to cry. It was horrible. It wasn't me, and it was such an awful feeling. It weighed on me for a long, long time, even after the war. The counselors insisted that the thief confess and admit what she had done. But no one stepped forward. Since two portions for our noon meal were missing again, there was an inspection. They searched everywhere now, in our blankets, which we always kept rolled up, and what do you know-two buns appeared! They were not in my things, but no one apologized to me. They probably thought it didn't matter if you make life difficult for such a stupid girl."

The story about the pilfering cut Marta to the quick. Had it not been for Eva Eckstein, their new counselor, she would have had a hard time getting over it. But Eva kindly took her under her wing. She sensed that Marta was not held in high regard by Tella, and she didn't want to make her life any more difficult than it already was. She herself had reservations about Tella. "I always had the feeling that whatever I did wasn't enough. She also pointed out to me that Eva Weiss did everything better than I did."

Eva Eckstein was born in Louny on November 7, 1924. She arrived in Theresienstadt in February 1942 and began working on the cleaning crew. Then, during the hard winter of 194243, she was a.s.signed to a commando in the forests of Kivoklat. After Eichmann's visit to Theresienstadt in April 1943, tents were set up in Market Square as a place to a.s.semble crates for the army, and Eva was a.s.signed to this "essential war production." In the wake of the transports of December 1943 and with the help of her friend Kamilla Rosenbaum, she was transferred to work in Youth Welfare.

Eva Eckstein was nineteen and more emotionally connected to the girls than Tella. She treated her wards with great kindness, especially Marta, whom she often took along when she visited her mother and two sisters. Marta had finally found someone who offered her trust and maternal affection, and who helped restore her self-confidence. Eva did her best to make life easier for the children. "The time I spent in Room 28," she would say half a century later, "was the best part of my stay in Theresienstadt."

By March the blue skies of February had long since yielded to Theresienstadt's typical gray weather and low-hanging clouds. Showers alternated with snow flurries, and no change seemed to be in sight. But life went steadily on. "It seems almost incredible to me," Helga wrote on March 18, 1944, "that in only one month and twenty-eight days I will be fourteen. I was talking with Papa yesterday and I asked him what he would have given me on my birthday in peacetime. He said that if he had the money, he would give me a globe, a microscope, and lots of books. It made me so happy that he had guessed what I wanted."

On April 3 she wrote: "The finest time in Theresienstadt is when I can debate with Papa. I learn so much. Yesterday Papa read me a few paragraphs from Schopenhauer; he's in favor of everyone keeping a diary. It makes me so happy that I can write to a good friend who will never desert me if I don't want it. At first almost all the girls kept a diary. Now it's only two or three."

By mid-April, Helga found that she had lost her appet.i.te and her stomach was aching-symptoms of jaundice. She was put back into sick bay. Her spirits plummeted. "Any idiot can see that this weather just won't end," she said during a visit to her father, who recorded her words in his own diary. "The sun is moving away from the earth."

Life in the ghetto seemed to be improving. "a.s.sembly this evening at eight o'clock about the new mail regulations. Permission to write every six weeks. All packages allowed except for tea, coffee, tobacco, cigarettes, and money, which are forbidden. In the future packages will be pa.s.sed on in the presence of the receiver," Otto Pollak noted on February 6. And one month later: "Cancellation of the rule that we must greet anyone in uniform."

March 6 to March 12 was spring-cleaning week. "Our Invalids' Home won a prize," Otto wrote. "My share was two pounds of bread, half a tin of liverwurst, three ounces of margarine, and three ounces of sugar." At six o'clock on the evening of March 11 he visited the coffeehouse: "Orchestra concert, sixteen musicians, with Professor Carlo S. Taube. They played selections from Mozart's Magic Flute Magic Flute, Fantasia from Schubert's sketchbook, Kreisler's Praeludium and Allegro, a solo by Frohlich, Dvoak's Fourth, two Slavic dances."

Change was in the air in Theresienstadt: "There is to be a new central medical library with a large reading room," Dr. Munk, the head of the health department, wrote on March 13, 1944, in a letter he sent to Jakob Edelstein on the a.s.sumption that Edelstein was in good health in Auschwitz-Birkenau. "The building that adjoins the Infants' Home is being added onto it; on the block set aside for small children a toddlers' nursery is being built in the movie hall, and the wooden barracks have become the living quarters for working women. The park on Market Square is making great progress, and within a few weeks there will be a fountain in the middle of a large flower bed. According to the plans, a music pavilion to be located opposite the coffeehouse seems to be very promising."2 The coffeehouse was one of the first additions meant to turn Theresienstadt into the Potemkin village that the n.a.z.is were about to build. Opened in December 1942, it marked the beginning of musical activities that were officially permitted and encouraged by the SS. At first it was Carlo S. Taube and the Lede Orchestra who usually played there along with the Weiss Jazz Quintet, which was directed by Fritz Weiss and featured musicians Pavel Libensky, Wolfi Lederer, Coco Schumann, and Franta Goldschmidt. As time went on, and as more musical instruments arrived in the ghetto and concerts were now performed on the explicit orders of the SS, additional ensembles were formed. In the winter of 194243, Karel Frohlich, Heini Taussig, Romouald Sussmann, and Freddy Mark formed a string quartet, which initially performed with the world-famous Viennese cellist Luzian Horwitz.

Once the second floor of the coffeehouse was opened for concerts, a group calling itself the Ghetto Swingers had great success with their first revue, t.i.tled "Children Not Admitted." This orchestra, whose members.h.i.+p constantly grew and changed, played in the style of an American swing band-even though jazz was forbidden within the Third Reich-and was instantly the most popular ensemble in Theresienstadt.

Entrance tickets to the coffeehouse Upon closer inspection, the coffeehouse did not offer what its name promised; it was anything but a warm, pleasant spot to enjoy swing music and a selection of delicious cakes and good coffee. First, you had to have an entrance pa.s.s, which you might be issued once or at most twice a year, and which designated the date and duration of your visit. "Authorization for a visit to the coffeehouse from noon to 2:00 P.M. P.M., ground floor," it might read. You could spend a maximum of two hours there over a cup of ersatz coffee. "But," as Thomas Mandl, who at age sixteen was a talented enough violinist to be a member of the coffee-house orchestra, said, "the good thing was that this cup of ersatz coffee was sweetened with a teaspoon of real sugar. And as a musician in the coffeehouse I was permitted one cup of coffee per s.h.i.+ft. Usually I saved up my coffee rations from three s.h.i.+fts and then on my fourth s.h.i.+ft had them give me a cup with four teaspoons of sugar. And that, of course, was an incredible way to fight off hunger."

Visitors, however, had to make do with just one cup of ersatz coffee and one teaspoon of sugar-definitely not enough to combat the agony of hunger. At best they managed to forget it for a while, thanks to lovely music by Lehar, Waldteufel, Bela Keler, Johann Strauss, or, when Busoni's brilliant pupil Carlo S. Taube was directing, challenging arrangements by Ravel and Saint-Saens.

The coffeehouse was reserved for adults and was essentially off-limits to the girls of Room 28. But the music often found its way up to them, for it came from Q 418 on "Neue Ga.s.se," as it was now called, a building that stood kitty-corner to the Girls' Home. From their windows the girls could watch people coming and going, although they could not observe what was happening inside.

But other unusual changes in the ghetto were not hidden from view. "The barricades are being taken down on Arische Stra.s.se, the barbed wire fence is being removed from the main square," Otto Pollak noted on April 1. And two days later: "Daylight saving time begins tomorrow. Evening curfew has been extended until nine o'clock."

Sometime during the night of April 11, one of the writers for Vedem Vedem sneaked into the "brain of the Theresienstadt rumor mill." Using the pseudonym Syndikus, he reported his discoveries as follows: "The first thing I learned was that our Father [Karl Rahm] intends to issue an order, the gist of which is that all work squads will be forced to send their youngest personnel to do so-called maintenance work. To a.s.sure the rapid reconstruction of our town, it was our Father's wish that specialists of all kinds should partic.i.p.ate to the fullest extent. For this purpose Father Bedich had the gymnasium, which had been turned into a hospital, cleared to have it converted into a synagogue, theater, and future cinema. According to the latest news, which I obtained just a few hours before writing this, an open-air cafe is to be established on the roof of the gymnasium. He had the barbed wire fence on the square removed and the square transformed into a park, where he had a music pavilion erected to give the inhabitants of Terezin an opportunity for entertainment and refreshment during their lunch hour and in the evening after work." sneaked into the "brain of the Theresienstadt rumor mill." Using the pseudonym Syndikus, he reported his discoveries as follows: "The first thing I learned was that our Father [Karl Rahm] intends to issue an order, the gist of which is that all work squads will be forced to send their youngest personnel to do so-called maintenance work. To a.s.sure the rapid reconstruction of our town, it was our Father's wish that specialists of all kinds should partic.i.p.ate to the fullest extent. For this purpose Father Bedich had the gymnasium, which had been turned into a hospital, cleared to have it converted into a synagogue, theater, and future cinema. According to the latest news, which I obtained just a few hours before writing this, an open-air cafe is to be established on the roof of the gymnasium. He had the barbed wire fence on the square removed and the square transformed into a park, where he had a music pavilion erected to give the inhabitants of Terezin an opportunity for entertainment and refreshment during their lunch hour and in the evening after work."3 Sure enough, between noon and one o'clock on April 13, a bright and sunny day, the town orchestra began to play for the first time under the alternating direction of Carlo S. Taube, Peter Deutsch, and Karel Anerl. It was scheduled to play on Market Square daily, if the weather was good, between eight and nine in the evening, an innovation that gave Syndikus cause for further speculation: "It is said that a restaurant is also going to be built beside the garden on the town square. The bill of fare has not yet been decided. Our town council has also ordered a fleet of hackney cabs for our international spa. The working people of Theresienstadt will also be provided for. There is to be a trolley line laid to make it easier for them to get to and from work."

Theresienstadt was well on its way to being turned into a sham show-piece, very much in the style of the village of facades that Prince Grigory Aleksandrovich Potemkin had quickly a.s.sembled to deceive Catherine the Great on her 1787 trip to inspect the south of Russia and observe the prosperity of the Crimea. Great swindles need just a little paint and a few false labels. The ba.n.a.l premise of this n.a.z.i propaganda campaign in Theresienstadt-it's not the contents but the packaging that count-had as its sole purpose deceiving the world as to the true goals of the n.a.z.i regime.

And so as of April 15, the daily decrees were now published, nicely ill.u.s.trated, as Communications from the Jewish Self-Administration Communications from the Jewish Self-Administration. The camp high command was renamed the SS Service Office, and the commandant became the head of the SS Service Office. The Jewish elder was transformed into the mayor, and the ghetto court was now the community court. The guards posted outside the barracks were no longer ghetto guards but community guards. And there were no longer any deportation trains leaving Theresienstadt, but workers' deployment transports. After all, Theresienstadt was not a concentration camp or a transit camp or a ghetto, but a Jewish settlement area-the "town that the Fuhrer gave the Jews."

There was even a contest-"Who Can Come Up with the Best Name?"-that was announced in the Communications from the Jewish Self-Administration Communications from the Jewish Self-Administration for April 23. "The following streets and squares are to be renamed: Rampart III, the lane around the former sheep barn behind Haupt Stra.s.se 2, the lane behind the building at Wall Stra.s.se 8 ... There are eight prizes in all: first prize, two tins of sardines in oil and a loaf of bread." for April 23. "The following streets and squares are to be renamed: Rampart III, the lane around the former sheep barn behind Haupt Stra.s.se 2, the lane behind the building at Wall Stra.s.se 8 ... There are eight prizes in all: first prize, two tins of sardines in oil and a loaf of bread."

The opening of the community center at the Sokolovna, on 3 West Ga.s.se, was celebrated on April 30, 1944, in the presence of the Council of Elders, the heads of all camp departments, and work brigades appointed by the town's administration. As the chronicler of the town's musical events, Viktor Ullmann, wrote, "To the delight of music lovers there was an ensemble composed of Messrs. Taussig, Kling, Sussmann, Mark, and Paul Kohn, joined by Karel Anerl for the performance of a Brahms s.e.xtet, which deserves special praise for its precision, clarity, beauty of tone, and unity of style."4 "Beautification" was the new slogan that turned all of Theresienstadt upside down and marked the implementation of a critical new phase that began with the introduction of camp commandant Karl Rahm, who arrived on February 8, 1944, as the replacement for Anton Burger. Born in Austria and trained as an auto mechanic, Rahm had been a member of the n.a.z.i Party since 1934, had worked closely with Eichmann in the Central Office for Jewish Emigration in Vienna and Prague, and was very well prepared for his a.s.signment, which Adolf Eichmann summed up succinctly at his trial in Israel as one of turning the ghetto of Theresienstadt into "a billboard for the outside world. He [Himmler] evidently wanted to have some evidence on hand, so that when special delegations from abroad addressed him on the issue of the murder of Jews and so forth, he could say, 'That's not true; go have a look at Theresienstadt.' "5 While the ghetto was undergoing these strange changes, the prisoners in it were increasingly gripped by mistrust, fear, and sadness. Where had their friends gone? Where were they now? How were they doing-Pavla, Zdenka, Olile, Poppinka, Holubika, Milka, Helena, Irena, Eva Weiss, and Eva Landa? Those were the questions the girls in Room 28 kept asking over and over. No postcards had arrived, no signs of life that might have eased their fears. "Eva, why did you leave?" Lenka Lindt wrote on a slip of paper on March 26, 1944. She missed her friend Eva Landa very much.

Watched over by their guards, the prisoners prepare for the visit of the Red Cross Delegation. Drawing by Alfred Kantor Eva, Eva, why did you leave?

Why have you left an open wound behind?

Why did you leave For a land so far away?Lenka, are you angry with me?

What could I have done?

I had to go away I could not defeat the Germans.I'm not angry with you, Eva. I do understand.

I know that if you could You would fulfill my wishes.You know, don't you, Evika That all will be well after the war And we will never leave one another.

After the war we shall meet again And renew our friends.h.i.+p.

Eva Landa had been deported to Auschwitz along with her mother, father, and friend Harry Kraus on December 15, 1943. "The 'trip' was horrible," she would report decades later.

We rode in a cattle car for about three days. In each sealed car were fifty people and their baggage. There was one small barred window. We couldn't lie down; there wasn't enough room. Some people died on the way. At one point I began to wail terribly. It was a genuine case of hysterics. They asked me what was the matter. And I said that we'd been traveling for so long and so far and that we would never come back. I had a premonition.On the third day we arrived in Auschwitz. Suddenly the door opened, and we saw a wide area garishly lit with spotlights and surrounded by barbed wire. There were strange creatures running up and down along the platform. They were wearing pajamas and little caps on their shaved heads; they shouted something and took our baggage away. They looked as though they were crazy. Then we were divided up: men on one side, women and children on the other. We were led to a building called the "sauna." That was a new word for me back then and I didn't understand what it meant. There they took all our remaining things away, our clothes and shoes. Then we had to stand under a shower that ran cold and then very hot, for about fifteen minutes. SS men walked back and forth the whole time-even though we were all completely naked! When it was over we were given old tattered clothes and wooden slippers. Only the soles were wooden, the rest was just old rags. Each of us got two slippers that didn't even match. Then we had to line up for "tattooing." We were ordered to hold out our left arm to be tattooed. My number was 71266, my mother's was 71267.That was how we spent the first night. The next morning we were led to the camp. There we met people from the transport that had left Theresienstadt in September. They told us how lucky we were that everyone had been taken to the sauna, that no selection had been made, and that no one had been sent directly to the gas chamber. We-the entire December transport-were a.s.signed to the so-called Family Camp B II b, where men, women, and children could remain together, although in separate barracks. In the opinion of the experienced prisoners, we were lucky in that as well, since in all the other camps, except the one for Gypsies, the separation of the men from the women, of the elderly and children from those capable of work, took place immediately on the ramp.

The Family Camp at Auschwitz-Birkenau had been set up by the prisoners of the September transport. As a few historians have noted (something that Eva Landa could not have known at the time), Himmler's goal here was the same as with his model ghetto of Theresienstadt. It was intended as a tool of cunning n.a.z.i propaganda in case it should become necessary to deceive foreign visitors about what was really going on in Auschwitz. That was why families in Camp B II b remained together. And that was why Fredy Hirsch was allowed by the SS to organize the children's block.

The September transport had been stamped with the secret directive "SB six months," which meant "Sonderbehandlung "Sonderbehandlung [special treatment] after six months of quarantine." SB was the n.a.z.i euphemism for "death by gas." [special treatment] after six months of quarantine." SB was the n.a.z.i euphemism for "death by gas."

"It was December 1943 and my life in Auschwitz-Birkenau began," Eva Landa continues.

December twenty-fifth was my thirteenth birthday. I was sick and terribly unhappy because I had been separated from my friends in Theresienstadt. I remembered my days in the ghetto as a happy time in my life. I couldn't shake the feeling that we would never go home again.It turned very cold, and we were poorly dressed. We were hungry. In the morning we were given a dark green liquid that was called "coffee," in the evening turnip soup and a piece of bad bread. The provisions we had brought with us were left on the train. We had to stand for hours of roll call. They would count us over and over again. It was torture.The quarantine period pa.s.sed, and we had to start working. My father had to pave a road, and my mother wove cloth for the German military industry. I was taken to the children's block run by Fredy Hirsch, where a life similar to the one we had in Theresienstadt was organized for us. We played sports, theater, and wrote poems. And we sang: "Alouette," "The Ode to Joy," Handel's "Hallelujah Chorus," and many more. I remember that one day we were singing a song in Latin and an SS man asked Fredy Hirsch what it was we were singing. And he replied, "G.o.d, give us bread and peace." To which the SS man said, "You've already got it." And Fredy replied, "That's why they're singing about it."The food in our block was better than in the others. Fredy Hirsch had seen to it that we got the same so-called children's soup that they had in the Gypsy camp. It was the same as the adult soup but with barley groats added, plus white bread. We thanked him with a little poem before meals: "In our taba'at taba'at group [Hebrew for 'ring'] we all are very hungry. / There's nothing to laugh about, because we have to wash our dishes, otherwise Fredy will shout at us. / And now we can sit down and-eat!" group [Hebrew for 'ring'] we all are very hungry. / There's nothing to laugh about, because we have to wash our dishes, otherwise Fredy will shout at us. / And now we can sit down and-eat!"A vague hope sprang up-maybe we would somehow succeed in leaving Auschwitz alive, although we knew what was going on around us. We even wrote skits about it. I remember there was a twelve-year-old named tepan, a cousin of Handa Pollak's. We had been in the same cla.s.s in Prague. He was small and very talented. He and his friends in the Auschwitz-Birkenau children's block enacted this scene for us: After the war tepan is walking along in Prague, and someone asks him what time it is. He looks at his arm and answers with the number tattooed there. And the pa.s.sersby say, "This fellow is crazy!" and grab him and take him to the madhouse. And he replies, "I knew I'd end up in Heydebreck." Heydebreck-that was a special term for us children. We didn't know any town by that name. We thought it was a n.a.z.i invention. For us going to Heydebreck meant being sent to the gas chambers.6March 6, 1944, was my boyfriend Harry's thirteenth birthday. I made a little heart out of the clay of Auschwitz for him and inscribed it: "To Harry on his birthday from Eva, March 6, 1944." The next day-it was T. G. Masaryk's birthday-there was a lockdown, and no one was allowed to leave our block. Those from the September transport had to move to a neighboring camp. Someone called over the fence, "Fredy je otraveny," "Fredy je otraveny," which in Czech means both to be in a bad mood and to be poisoned. I can still recall my father trying to comfort me with the first version. But we soon learned the terrible truth. which in Czech means both to be in a bad mood and to be poisoned. I can still recall my father trying to comfort me with the first version. But we soon learned the terrible truth.Fredy Hirsch had taken his life. When he saw that resistance was pointless, he swallowed poison. The next day, March 8, 1944, the entire September transport, except for those with infectious illnesses, were ga.s.sed, including four girls from our room-Pavla Seiner, Olilie Lowy, Zdenka Lowy, and Ruth Popper. My father died on April 13. Only our December transport was still left in the Family Camp. People talked quite openly about how we were to be ga.s.sed six months after our arrival.

Eva Weiss, the girls' counselor, had also arrived in Auschwitz-Birkenau with Transport Dr on December 15. Her orders had come as a shock to her-she was the only one in her family to be transported. And so she had to set out by herself, "on the most mysterious of all journeys," as she says when she begins to describe her experiences. "It was a trauma." To this day Eva has tears in her eyes when she remembers the day she had to say goodbye.

A great deal has been said and written about that trip in cattle cars, and it's all true. It was horrible. Locked up for three days without food, without water, barely enough air to breathe. I'll never forget the moment of our arrival, it was deepest winter, the ground covered with snow. It was like a sudden storm sweeping over all our senses: blinding spotlights aimed directly at our eyes, which had grown used to darkness after three days in the cattle cars; shouts and-this was the worst part-the barking of savage, fierce dogs. We could barely see and couldn't understand what was happening. All I wanted was- water! Despite all the threats I clung to my little backpack, which contained my most cherished things-above all my photo alb.u.m. In the forced march to one of the buildings I managed to scoop up a little snow and put it in my mouth-what a wonderful relief that was.They crammed us into an empty block, where a few girls were sitting behind a table. They were wearing striped uniforms, and their heads were shaved. We didn't know where we were. Then some of the girls-they spoke mainly Polish and Slovak-came over to us and demanded our valuables. They said that we wouldn't be needing them anymore. It was like a dream, and I gave them my watch. I don't know when or how, but my precious backpack vanished at some point. The girls at the table registered us one after the other and tattooed a number on our arms. Mine was 73673. I told myself that this number wasn't the worst possible number.Then we were led to the so-called sauna; we had to undress and leave our clothes behind. We were searched in every possible spot for any valuables, and then we had to stand under the shower, which poured out ice-cold water. Since I didn't have my mother with me and was feeling feverish, I joined up with my friend Eva Schlachet, whose mother was with her. I was sick, and they were both very kind to me. Time pa.s.sed, and I can see myself in a blue coat and with shoes that felt very strange, walking along a path between barbed wire fences. Because I had a fever, I have only a vague recollection of it all. Then I ended up on a bunk beside Zuzanna Rikova-who is now a famous musician in Prague. She and her mother looked after me. I must have contracted dysentery from that snow I ate. I fainted at the first roll call.We were housed in separate blocks-men, women, and children. Our camp was called B II b in Birkenau. I don't remember much, except that I felt terribly abandoned without my mother. Slowly I recovered and began to take part in the "activities."A few days later Fredy Hirsch came and took me with him to Block 31-the so-called children's block. I was greeted very warmly. I knew most of the counselors from Theresienstadt, and many of the children as well, some of whom were from Room 28. I remember being so happy to see Poppinka [Ruth Popper] and Pavla Seiner and Olilie again. They had been in the camp since September, and some, like Eva Landa, had arrived on my transport. I remember Eva very well, because she was an anchor in my group, very pretty and full of energy. I know there were other girls as well, but I don't recall their names.I was a subst.i.tute mother to many of the orphans, a subst.i.tute mother under extreme conditions. It was my job to play with them and give them lessons-without books or any other materials. The important thing was to make them forget where they were and what was happening around them. We played word games, sang, danced, even memorized parts for plays and skits, which the children then put on. One of these was Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and another was and another was Robinson Crusoe Robinson Crusoe. There were lots of optimistic songs, always with a happy end. Sometimes the SS men would come by and watch us; some of them, or so it seemed to me, turned sentimental. Maybe they were thinking of their own children.All the older children, and, I think, many of the younger ones, understood only too well what was happening around us. There was no way not to see the chimneys with flames shooting out at the top. The smoke permeated the air. "No one leaves here except up through the chimney"-how often we heard that statement!The neighboring camps were used as transit camps. We could see across the fence. One day we discovered a friend from the Zionist movement. It was Dov Revesz, a Hungarian. He was too exhausted to call back to us. The next day the camp was empty.We heard Russian prisoners nearby for a few days, singing their beautiful, melancholy songs. At times we even chimed in. Sometimes we sang Czech and Hebrew songs. But soon the Russian soldiers were no longer there.We celebrated Jewish holidays and even solemnly observed the Sabbath. When someone had a birthday, we threw a little party. We didn't have much to eat, but we saved up something from our tiny rations-a little slice of our bread, which seemed as though it had been made from sawdust, a bit of margarine, and, when we had it, a smidgen of turnip marmalade. Those were the ingredients for our "birthday cake." I recall that I once decorated a couple of them to look like dominos.Directly across from our block was the hospital where Dr. Mengele conducted his experiments with twins. And there were twins among us as well whom he was interested in. When Mengele showed up, the cry pa.s.sed from barracks to barracks like a jungle telegram, "Twins to thirty-two," and then all the twins had to report to him. I remember the Salus twins from Brno, who both had one blue eye and one brown eye. That shout of "Twins to thirty-two!" was almost something of a joke. We had no idea about his awful experiments. And I suppose we simply didn't want to believe the rumors about them.In February there were rumors that the entire September transport would be sent to a labor camp-to "Heydebreck," as the SS put it. The rumor came from the Auschwitz underground movement, whose members were mainly Communists. Although it all looked quite hopeless, Fredy Hirsch and some of his counselors-I remember one of them, Hugo Lengsfeld-discussed plans for an uprising. I seem to recall that someone had smuggled a hand grenade and some matches into the camp. We were told what to do if worse came to worst.Early in March, the SS gave each of us a postcard. We were told that we could write to our relatives on the outside. We were allowed only thirty words, and we had to date them about one or two weeks ahead. I think the date was March 26. Of course we all tried to guess what this was about. It was quite unusual. We tried to use the thirty words to say where we were and what was happening to us. We had to write our messages in code and hope that they would be understood. For example, we used the name of someone who was dead and wrote that we had met him. Or we wrote that we had met Mavet- Mavet-which is Hebrew for "death." All the cards arrived. But by the time they did, most of the people who had written them were already dead.March 7, 1944, will always remain in my memory. The day began with a lockdown, a sure sign that something was about to happen. All the people from the September transport, and also some children of my group, had to move to the neighboring camp. There was a lot of shouting. I can still recall that I was in Fredy's room, but I no longer recall what we spoke about. I didn't know that all of them were to be ga.s.sed. He knew; that's for certain. But he didn't say a word.Our rebellion never took place. And Fredy, our leader and inspiration, took poison, fell into a coma, and was carried out. The camp was very quiet afterward-as though after a defeat.The news that spread through the camp the next day was horrifying: the entire September transport had gone to the gas chambers. They died with many of them singing the Czech national anthem or "Hatikvah" or the "Internationale." We knew the same fate awaited us at the end of June, six months after our arrival.We had lost a good many counselors, but we kept up our work, mourning for all those we missed. Fredy Hirsch's position was taken over by Seppl Lichtenstein, who was also connected with the underground. We had to get used to the idea that we didn't have long to live. We made jokes about it, and even laughed-because that was the only way we could bear it.We went on singing and playing just as before. We had a little s.p.a.ce outside where we could do sports, jump around, and dance. Off to one side we could see the chimneys, the embers of their flames against the sky, and sometimes terrible screams would reach us-at one point children were simply tossed into the fire. On the other side we could see barbed wire and the railroad tracks beyond, where trains arrived day and night. By then it was primarily Jews from Hungary. Most of them went directly into the gas chambers.

It was around noon on May 11, 1944, when news of more transports to the East exploded like a bomb in Theresienstadt. On the streets, in the barracks and Homes, the dreaded word haunted every conversation: "transport." It was said to be for seventy-five hundred people. Who would be included this time? And the guessing began all over again as to who would receive that ominous slip of paper. Some said it would be mainly old people and TB patients, while others said that it would affect men of working age.

Fredy Hirsch. There is no way today to find out for certain whether Fredy Hirsch committed suicide or if, in order to prevent an uprising, camp doctors intentionally gave him an overdose of the sedatives that he had asked for. There are several contradictory versions. One thing, however, is certain: Fredy Hirsch faced a hopeless situation. He was aware that no uprising could save the lives of the children under his care.

Only a few could lull themselves into a sense of relative security: the so-called Mischlinge Mischlinge (children of mixed marriages), those who had been awarded important medals during the war, their families, and those who had been designated as "prominent." (children of mixed marriages), those who had been awarded important medals during the war, their families, and those who had been designated as "prominent."7 Rumor had it that the munic.i.p.al orchestra, the community guards, and the fire department were also protected-they were still needed. But all the others? Rumor had it that the munic.i.p.al orchestra, the community guards, and the fire department were also protected-they were still needed. But all the others?

The transport orders had already been prepared. "At 7 A.M A.M. on May 13th," Otto Pollak wrote, "Joka arrives with the bad news that Hermann, Trude, and Lea are on the transport. Helga arrives with Lea at the office unannounced. At the sight of that beaming, smiling childish face and at the thought of such an innocent creature departing for who knows what, I start to cry. I go out on the veranda. Helga, with tears rolling down her cheeks, follows and says in real pain: 'I feel as if my little sister will be leaving.' "

Seventy-five hundred people got ready for transport. In Room 28 it was Erika Stranska, Alice Sittig, Ruth Schachter (Zajiek), Miriam Rosenzweig, and Hanka Wertheimer who packed their suitcases and bags. "My mother told me that we had to leave. She was very sick at the time," Hanka recalls. "She had always hoped that Jakob Edelstein, the chief Jewish elder, would help keep her off the transports. She knew him personally, from Brno, through her members.h.i.+p in the Zionist organization Blue-White. But he had long since left the ghetto. On May 15 we all boarded Transport Dz-my mother, my grandmother, my great-aunt, and me. My friend Miriam from Room 28 was on it, too."

The many goodbyes began. "You know, after the war: Olbramovice 1," Handa said while she hugged her friend. And Hanka replied as she had so many times: "After the war I'll wait for you under the Old Bell Tower on the Old City Ring." Nothing could shake her faith: the war would soon be over, they would all see each other again in Prague, and one day they would emigrate to Eretz Yisrael. Others were less confident. It was hardest to say goodbye to Zajiek, who was being deported along with her brother Alexander.

Tears. Hugs. Words of comfort-imparting brave or forlorn serenity in the face of an inescapable fate. And some final gift for a comrade- a slice of bread, a piece of gingerbread from a recent package, a warm sweater. Those "departing" needed to know that they were all still bound together.

It was almost impossible to sleep. Everyone was depressed, even Marianne Deutsch, although she had an unusual reason. She felt almost a little envious that she " wasn't allowed to go," that she could not get away from Theresienstadt, which she detested, from the involuntary community of Room 28, where she did not feel at all at home. Wherever they were going, it couldn't be worse than here, she thought. "I was naive, a child," she would say later. "I didn't know what those transports to the East really meant."

Handa, by contrast, was filled with deep forebodings, as a poem in her notebook reveals: I walk down the stairs Alone, lost in my thoughts Outside peace and quiet reign The quiet of the night That I so loveThe moon rises s.h.i.+ning through the fog Stands there, alone Like an eye that's weepingThe cross on the church s.h.i.+mmers silver Here and there a ray of light Pierces a windowI keep on walking Down the stairs The moon emerges from the fog Adorned with a wreath of tears Every puddle sparkles like a star I keep on walking Lost in my thoughtsI watch as the wind Brushes through the trees As the town sleeps As everything sleeps I keep on walking Lost in my thoughts.The light behind the windows Has gone out My eye is lost in the fog Of the beauty that surrounds me My thoughts Twist and turn inside my head And my head burns Like white-hot ironHanda Pollak, from her notebook, Vechno, 1944 1944 The suitcases and the backpacks were packed. On May 14, Otto Pollak noted: "Said our early morning goodbyes to Hermann, See Stra.s.se 16, and to Trude and Lea. They are all calm and resigned. At ten o'clock last night Hermann and I agreed upon a code for our letters."

"We watched people moving down the street, dragging their bags and suitcases, their transport numbers hung around their necks, and we were terribly afraid," Judith Schwarzbart recalls. "No one knew where they were going. No one knew what the Germans had in mind. No one knew if we would ever see one another again. And the people pa.s.sing below us there, they were afraid, too."

Among them were Mimi Sander and her mother, Frau Porges. "Unforgettable sight," Otto Pollak wrote in his diary that same day. "Hugo in the little wagon. Mother Porges bracing herself at the rear. Mimi, composed and holding her head up high, linking arms with her stooping mother. Gustav is pulling the wagon. Hugo's steering shaft breaks. Let's hope it's not a bad omen."

Miriam and Hanka also made their way to the Hamburg Barracks. Everything was in an uproar. In one part of the building people were a.s.sembling to be transported out; in another part were new arrivals from other transports. Suddenly amid the throng Hanka spotted Eva Ginz, a friend and former cla.s.smate from the Jewish School in Prague and the sister of Petr Ginz. "I can still see her there before me," Hanka recalls. "I'm standing under the porch and we wave to each other from a distance. I'm leaving Theresienstadt and Eva is just arriving." It was a reunion and a goodbye all in one. Neither knew what lay before her.

May 15. "Hermann, Trude, and Lea left in a cattle car at two o'clock." The total number was twenty-five hundred people; this was the first group. The lists for the second were already prepared. Another ma.s.s of people moved toward the a.s.sembly point in the Hamburg Barracks, where both L 2 and the train tracks ran along the rear facade. Countless trains, loaded with thousands of human beings, had been rolling in the direction of Auschwitz. These transport hubs for transports were referred to as "sluices."

In reality, the entire ghetto had become a sluice. "An endless stream of hundreds of thousands of lives poured in," Jindich Flusser has written, "slowing down for a moment as the water level rose, seemingly calm, until it reached the brink of the sluice. This s.p.a.ce had the capacity for up to 35,000 naked human lives. They were herded here from Prague and Vitkovice, from Hamburg and Vienna. The water level kept rising- until the sluice was emptied. Men and women and children were washed by the thousands, even tens of thousands, out of this dusty basin and borne eastward on a river of death."8 Flaka, Helga, and many of the other girls had volunteered to lend a hand. Wearing white headscarves and red armbands, they sneaked into the Hamburg Barracks to do the one thing within their power: to give comfort to their families and friends.

The transport list for the third group was posted. Judith's brother Gideon was on the list. "It all went very quickly. Suddenly he was a.s.signed to his group. We didn't even see each other. We couldn't say goodbye to him."

At the last moment, camp commandant Karl Rahm unexpectedly intervened in the transport procedures and crossed out the names of a few young people on the list. Why? The answer was soon apparent: They were needed as walk-ons for the great hoax. But by now the elderly and the frail had no chance.

"Poor things," fourteen-year-old ary Weinstein wrote in her diary. "They will die soon enough in any case, and they could do that here just as well. This is supposed to be a model ghetto after all, so why do they send people away, especially old people? Maybe because it wouldn't seem so nice if others saw them begging for a bowl of disgusting soup? The town is overcrowded, and that doesn't leave a good impression either."9 "In this one week, 7,500 Jews have left the ghetto and are being taken somewhere into an unknown future, but we don't know where that is," Gonda Redlich jotted in his diary. "They're leaving in order to make more room. And now a 'commission' will be visiting the city and will render its verdict: Everything is fine. The town is so lovely, with a whole lot of children's homes, coffeehouses, wonderful halls and green gardens; the Jews live in s.p.a.cious rooms."10 Transport Dz (May 15), Transport Ea (May 16), and Transport Eb (May 18) bore their cargo of 7,503 people toward the East. The town's population sank to about 28,000-less than half of what it had been at its highest point in September 1942. There was a little more air in the ghetto, but no one was breathing a sigh of relief. "After the commotion of the last few days, calmness has returned," Otto Pollak noted on May 19, "a mournful calmness and loneliness."

The paralyzing calm that reigned in Theresienstadt after the May transports gave way to a phase of hectic activity. Anyone who could change to a better bunk or better quarters did so. Some of the prominent people were a.s.signed to a room of their own, so they could live together with their families. Improvements were made in the living arrangements of the Danes, and a couple of rooms-all on the ground floor of buildings visible from Haupt Stra.s.se-were nicely furnished, with pictures on the walls, flowerpots on the windowsills, and pretty curtains at the windows.

But in the larger rooms of the barracks, in the attics and rear courtyards, and on the third floor of the Girls' Home, in Room 28, everything remained just as it was.

The sole objects of the beautification campaign were public buildings and those quarters that were sure to strike the eye of the upcoming visitors-a delegation from the International Red Cross, which everyone had been talking about for months11-or that could be strategically called to their attention. Along with the quarters of a few prominent people and the Danes, these buildings included the Bank of the Jewish Self-Administration, the town hall, the post office, the children's nursery, the coffeehouse, and the Sokolovna. And of course the "mayor's office" in the Magdeburg Barracks-the headquarters of the Jewish Self-Administration and the Council of Elders.

As part of this short-lived deceptive maneuver, these buildings were scrubbed until they shone, as were a few streets, courtyards, and pathways. "Everyone was a.s.signed to the cleanup," recalls the pianist Alice Herz-Sommer, who herself was ordered to join a street-cleaning brigade. "We mopped the streets, we cleaned the coffeehouse, and there was one shop that had to be cleaned as well, and its displays tidied up. The bank and the hospitals, too. It all had to be clean as a whistle. Picture this little town with its usual population of five thousand-it was full of people wherever you went; it was black with people! It was such a little place that you could hardly move. There was no possible way to clean it up properly."

The Bank of the Jewish Self-Administration was founded on orders from the SS and opened on May 12, 1943. It was the crowning achievement of the hoax and played the key role in the entire fraud. Even bank notes were printed-ghetto kronas.

Theresienstadt, "the face of an involuntary community," as H. G. Adler has called it,12 was a perfect deception, built on smoke and mirrors. Else Krasa wrote a poem about it with a telling t.i.tle: "As If." She dedicated the poem to Leo Strauss, son of the "operetta king" Oscar Strauss and one of the chief writers for the Theresienstadt cabaret: was a perfect deception, built on smoke and mirrors. Else Krasa wrote a poem about it with a telling t.i.tle: "As If." She dedicated the poem to Leo Strauss, son of the "operetta king" Oscar Strauss and one of the chief writers for the Theresienstadt cabaret: I know a little town A town that has some spiff I'll not betray its name So let's call it "As If."

Leo Strauss set this little verse to brilliant music. In Theresienstadt these words came to form a kind of running joke, but also a philosophy of life and survival, and a motto.

And so when Helga's fourteenth birthday came around on May 28, 1944, it was celebrated in accordance with this motto-much to the surprise of the birthday girl, who only a few weeks earlier had said to her father, "If there are transports and my friends have to leave, my birthday will be a very sad one, because we have lived like sisters in our Home."

Now it was all turning out very differently. Helga was invited to a "festive seven-course banquet in the Grand-Hotel Hecht, Bahnhof Stra.s.se 31." One course after another was served in the "as if mode: "Bean soup with noodles, spring vegetables, snow-peas and carrots with roasted potatoes on onions, sardine snacks on toast, open-face sandwiches with sausage and bacon, pineapple pudding, mocha a la ghetto with pastries, ending with a selection of desserts." Only a wisp of these delicacies actually appeared on the table, but where quality and quant.i.ty were not what they should have been, imagination came to the rescue- daily life in the camp offered lots of opportunities for that.13 "The child wasn't expecting such a lovely party," Otto Pollak wrote that same evening in his diary. "At five o'clock we distributed presents. The festive dinner, then, was at half past five. All those courses made us forget our Theresienstadt misery. During the meal Hecht [house eldest in the Home for Invalids L 231] gave a stirring speech."

Birthday card for Helga's fourteenth birthday Helga returned to Room 28 laden with gifts. By Theresienstadt standards, what she held in her hands was a small fortune. We know this from Otto Pollak's list of her presents: "From Maria, a blouse, a winter and a summer dress, and a cake; from Hecht, a necklace and three chocolate bonbons, Odol mouthwash and Nivea cream; from Schmitz, two large notebooks and a wooden box; from Hugo, a travel manicure set; from Leuchter, the engineer, a bouquet of lilacs with two tulips; from Papa, a belt, a handbook, a bar of Palmolive soap, a chrome and nickel bracelet with a watch, and a Pelikan fountain pen with a fourteen-carat-gold nib."

Unfortunately, we have no direct account from Helga about how she felt that evening. In 1956, during the Suez Crisis, when Helga was moving from Addis Ababa to London, fire broke out in the s.h.i.+p's cargo room, and the container carrying several of her most precious possessions, including the third volume of her diary and her poetry alb.u.m, was destroyed.

It seems quite likely that once the birthday celebration had pa.s.sed, Helga quickly reawakened to the reality of Theresienstadt, just as she did after a concert given on April 5, 1944, as can be seen in this last entry in the second volume of her diary: Menu for Helga's fourteenth birthday: "A banquet served in the spirit of 'As If!' "

Wednesday, April 5, 1944Today I attended a Beethoven concert. They played a violin sonata. Taussig played the violin and Professor Kaff was at the piano.14 Then came a piano sonata that Kaff played by heart. He lived the music. He played with his eyes closed. For me it was like a fairy tale, with fairies dancing and singing on a meadow at the edge of the woods. There were small animals, too. Then came a loud rumble, and someone said that a dragon was coming down the road in search of prey from the Kingdom of the Forest. They ran off in all directions, looking for a place to hide. The fairies fled into their subterranean kingdom, the animals dashed into their subterranean homes and up into the trees, etc. And now the dragon arrived in the meadow. And what does he see, right under his nose? A little fawn who couldn't get away in time because it had slipped and fallen and wasn't able to get up again. The dragon grabs the fawn and takes his prey back to his castle Then came a piano sonata that Kaff played by heart. He lived the music. He played with his eyes closed. For me it was like a fairy tale, with fairies dancing and singing on a meadow at the edge of the woods. There were small animals, too. Then came a loud rumble, and someone said that a dragon was coming down the road in search of prey from the Kingdom of the Forest. They ran off in all directions, looking for a place to hide. The fairies fled into their subterranean kingdom, the animals dashed into their subterranean homes and up into the trees, etc. And now the dragon arrived in the meadow. And what does he see, right under his nose? A little fawn who couldn't get away in time because it had slipped and fallen and wasn't able to get up again. The dragon grabs the fawn and takes his prey back to his castle.The forest dwellers return to the meadow and sing and dance. But then the fawn's mother appears, weeping. She tells them that she couldn't come sooner to join the others because she was not feeling well, and had sent her fawn on ahead with the idea that she would follow as soon as she was feeling better. Now that she is here-she cannot find her child. They all join in the search, but don't find the fawn, and they realize that the dragon has it well, and had sent her fawn on ahead with the idea that she would foll