The Willow Wren by Philipp Schott (free ebook reader for iphone txt) 📕

every woman they could find, often more than once, including Frau Bergen’s sister. Two of her sister’s friends killed themselves after, they were so ashamed.”

“Mama!” I could not believe that she was telling me this and, moreover, that this was supposed to be part of an argument to stay!

“Wait, Ludwig, I am not finished. I am telling you this to make you understand that I know more than you do how terrible the Red Army can be, yet we will stay. We will stay because I also know that this is how the Red Army behaves after winning a battle. The men are in a frenzy of hate. Here it is the Americans that won the battle and the Russians that are coming have not fought for many days. There will be a peaceful transfer of authority. I trust Colonel Armstrong to make sure his Soviet successor abides by the Geneva Convention. The Americans will be just right across the river after all! I think the Russians will be on their best behaviour when watched like this.”

“I am still afraid, Mama.”

“I understand, but it will be fine. Also I should tell you another reason why we can’t leave.”

“What is that?”

“I’m pregnant. I’m due in October.”

A brief and entirely horrifying hygiene class at the KLV-Lager had given me the basics. I did the nine-month math and was confused. I suppose Papa had been here in January, but with these two rooms and all the kids, how was that possible? Perhaps he also came once during the week when Theodor and I were not there. Nonetheless it created an unsettling mental image of an extremely rapid . . . transaction. I added this to my growing storehouse of off-limits memories, thoughts and images. I was becoming good at deliberately compartmentalizing my mind.

The Red Army marched in early the next morning. Whereas the Americans were healthy and well fed, the Russians were mostly as starved-looking as we were, often just boys in torn and ill-fitting uniforms. But they looked very proud as they paraded into the market square for the brief hand-over ceremony, which consisted of nothing more than a handshake between Colonel Armstrong and Major Kozlov. Several locals had come out to wave red flags to welcome our new masters. If you looked at the flags carefully you would notice that there was a circular hole in the centre. These were Nazi flags with the swastika cut out. Communist or fascist, red or brown, blue, green or purple, nobody cared anymore. Please just end the war and please do not hurt us.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

May 8, 1945

On Tuesday, May 8, Germany finally surrendered. It should have surrendered months earlier, but at least it was clear that there would be no dragged out Werewolf resistance as the Party leadership had wanted. The war was truly over. We heard the news from the Russians shouting. Kozlov issued extra vodka rations and Mama kept us inside. As far as I know the celebrations were limited to singing and vomiting.

Mama had been right.

Later I heard one funny story from the end of the war that is worth sharing. Apparently the supreme commander of the Luftwaffe, Hermann Göring, surrendered to the Americans in southern Austria where he was trying to make a getaway with his daughter. They were in a luxury Mercedes-Benz filled with expensive luggage. Once in custody he chatted happily with the American officers, toasted them with Champagne he had brought along and posed for photos, smiling broadly and generally being charming. When Eisenhower found out about this, he was very angry and immediately ordered Göring to be treated like a high-security-risk prisoner. He was the highest-ranking Nazi left alive, Hitler, Himmler and Göbbels having all died by suicide.

Göring followed them a year later in Nuremberg. He had been sentenced to hang for war crimes, but he felt that this fate was dishonourable so he killed himself with a cyanide capsule hidden in a gold fountain pen that he had either managed to bribe his American guard into bringing to him from his confiscated personal effects, or he had tricked him into doing so — history is unclear on this point.

Chapter Thirty

May 15, 1945

The next Tuesday at dawn there was a knock on the door. Mama and I were early risers, so we were both already awake. I am sure we both thought the same thing — Russians, which at this hour was troubling. I motioned for Mama to step out of view and I opened the door. Standing there was an emaciated boy, covered in dirt and sores, wearing a filthy tan-coloured uniform tunic, holding wet boots in one hand and a small bundle of wildflowers in the other.

“Hello, Ludwig,” he said weakly.

It was Theodor! I honestly did not recognize him at first, but when he said my name I knew.

“Theodor!” I shouted and hugged him, the first time I had ever done so and, to the best of my recollection, the last. Mama pushed me aside. A frenzy of tears and hugs followed. Theodor was in terrible condition. He explained briefly that he had been walking for days, often with nothing to eat and often sleeping rough. His boots fit so badly that his Achilles tendons were exposed through open sores that were weeping pus. Unsure of where the lines of control were and wanting to evade the Russians, he had looped to the west and arrived on the American side of the Mulde, which he’d swum across. That was all Mama would let him tell us before attending to his wounds, feeding him from the little we had and allowing him to rest.

Before he submitted to Mama’s care he said, “These flowers are for Clara. It’s her birthday, is it not?” Indeed it was. Our little sister was turning nine. She wept when he handed her the flowers. Theodor slept almost the entire day. While he was asleep Mama gave me a particularly fine silver ladle