Too Many Men (11 page)

to 1943.” Ruth tried to take deep breaths. She was obviously more anxious than she realized. She had experienced anxiety symptoms before. She would walk back to the hotel and have a long bath. A long bath would soothe her.

“Please do not confuse me with Rudolf Hess,” the voice said. “I hate T O O M A N Y M E N

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this when people confuse me with Rudolf Hess. He has only been here since 1987. And he chose to come. He committed suicide as you of course know. He was ninety-three.”

Ruth vomited into the gutter. She felt a bit better. “What are you frightened of?” the voice said. “Nobody is frightened of me, anymore.” The noise of her heart thumping almost drowned out all other sound. “Let me tell you about myself,” the voice said. “Let me tell you what has happened to me.” Ruth started walking. “I need to tell you this,” the voice said.

“I need to not hear it,” Ruth said.

“I knew that you would speak to me, very soon,” the voice said.

Ruth wiped her face with the tissues she always carried in her pocket.

She walked slowly in the direction of the hotel. Her mouth felt foul. She had forgotten what an awful taste vomit left. She had only vomited two or three times in her life. She must have food poisoning, she thought. Food poisoning would also explain the hallucinations.

“I saw you arrive in Poland,” the voice said. “I have seen many people arrive in Poland. But I knew you were the one. I knew you were the one.”

“Where are you?” Ruth said suddenly. She was shocked when she heard the words coming out of her mouth.

“I am in Zweites Himmel’s Lager,” the voice said. “They call it the second camp of heaven. A subbranch of heaven, a satellite camp. My English is good, no?” Ruth stopped walking. “Some people like to call it Zweites Himmel’s Kamp,” he said. “It has a more soft feel.
Lager
is a more militaristic word. But I know it is a Lager. I know, after all, about Lagers. Some of the other inhabitants here do not.

“I know also it is not Zweites Himmel’s Lager. It is not heaven. They refuse to call it what it is. Who do they think they fool? Most of us, up here, know that it is hell. Do not look so surprised. Hell is up here. Hell is not under the ground. That is a myth. It was a clever idea to put hell up here. It is next to heaven. People are not too sure where they are going when they come here. After all, who would go of their own free will under the earth?

Nobody.”

Ruth didn’t know that she had looked surprised. She had thought that she was dazed. Expressionless.

“You’re Rudolf Höss?” she said.

“Of course I am Rudolf Höss,” the voice said. “Who would pretend to

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L I L Y B R E T T

be Rudolf Höss?” He paused. “I am not who I used to be, however. I have arthritis in my right shoulder, something is wrong with my leg, my stomach gives me trouble, and my bones hurt.

“Stop looking so surprised. You can feel your bones in Zweites Himmel’s Lager. Even if you have been cremated. You can still feel all parts of you. It is terrible. If you are in Zweites Himmel’s Lager, you cannot get anything fixed up. If you have an ailment, there is no treatment. This is not the case in Himmel. In heaven, I see dead people in very good condition. I have tried for many years to get out of Zweites Himmel’s Lager, but it is not easy.

“There were not many Jews here when I arrived,” he said. “The Jews seemed mainly to be in the main camp, heaven. That was a relief, to me.

Now, there are quite a few Jews in this subcamp, Zweites Himmel’s Lager.

They do not express any more hostility toward me than anybody else.”

“If I can talk to you,” Ruth said, “why can’t I communicate with my mother?” It was a trick question. A question she hadn’t thought up an answer to. A test, to see if she was really talking to herself. To see if she had slipped over that fine line that separates sanity and insanity.

“I have worked harder to get through to you,” Höss said.

“Are you suggesting my mother doesn’t want to speak to me?” Ruth said.

“I am not suggesting anything,” Höss said.

“Why am I asking you about my mother?” said Ruth.

“Because I am closer to her than you are,” Höss said.

“Physical proximity is meaningless,” Ruth said. “Otherwise you’d be close to people every time you were in a crowd. Anyway, you’re dead. You haven’t got a physical being so how can you have physical proximity?”

“If I have not got a physical being, how can my bones hurt?” Höss said.

“I don’t know,” she said. “You’re the one with all the answers.”

“Why do you stop walking when you talk to me?” Höss said. “I am still here when you walk. I am not standing in one place. Zweites Himmel’s Lager—I should really call it what it is—hell, is everywhere.”

“I can’t do two things at once,” Ruth said. “I’ve always had trouble concentrating on more than one thing at a time.”

“Maybe you are not such a clever Jew,” Höss said. “That of course is a joke.” Ruth didn’t laugh. “It should be acceptable to make a joke about Jews,” Höss said. “It is not possible to see Jews only in a serious or tragic T O O M A N Y M E N

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way. Jews are supposed to have a sense of humor. They always had a reputation for humor. Although we never saw Jews being amusing or funny in Auschwitz. It has only been since I was cremated and shipped to Zweites Himmel’s Lager that I have seen what was meant by this Jewish sense of humor. You are not offended by my talking about Jews like this? Even Germans should be permitted, now, to laugh at Jews.”

“Laugh
at,”
Ruth said, “is where you have slipped up. Laugh
with
, maybe.” Ruth heard a series of groans and grunts.
“Scheisse,”
Höss said, “I will never get to Himmel if I make bad mistakes like this.”

“I know what
scheisse
means,” Ruth said. “Shit.”

“I did not mean to say
scheisse,
and I did not mean to say laugh at.”

Höss said. “I meant to say laugh with, of course.”

“Of course,” Ruth said.

“I have not managed to graduate yet from the sensitivity-training class in Zweites Himmel’s Lager,” Höss said. “It is a requirement, a prerequisite that one graduates from this class before they will even consider a request for transfer to Himmel, to heaven. I have studied this class for fifty-one years and eight months.

“They forced me to enroll the day after my execution. Sensitivity training. What a subject. It was not very sensitive of the Polish military tribunal to decide that I should be executed in Auschwitz, right next to the house where I lived with my wife and five children. Only two of these tribunal members are up here, with me. I have looked for the others.”

Ruth realized, with a shock, that she no longer felt ill. She felt almost normal. Suddenly, it seemed normal to be talking to someone who wasn’t there. Something must be wrong with her, she thought.

“Why can I hear you?” she said to Höss.

“Some people are more sensitive to what is around them than others,”

he said. “You are sensitive. You would probably pass the sensitivity-training class that I have this trouble with. Being able to hear people who have departed is just an ordinary aspect of sensitivity. There is nothing out of the ordinary about this ability. It is a sensitivity. I know a lot about sensitivity.

Don’t forget I have studied the subject for nearly fifty-two years.”

“ ‘Departed’ is a stupid word,” Ruth said. “People die, they don’t depart. Anyway, you don’t know that much about sensitivity. You fail the class year after year.”

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L I L Y B R E T T

“They discriminate against me,” Höss said. “The judges, as soon as they see me, they say, ‘fail.’ I see plenty of unintelligent people who pass this class. And I can see that I am more sensitive. I can definitely sense more things than I used to. I can sense, I think, that you have an understanding of what has made you so sensitive.”

“What are you talking about?” Ruth said. She knew that she was always interpreting and translating words and actions, always exploring and observing facial expressions and physical gestures.

“I am talking about sensitivity,” Höss said. “It is a very irritating topic.

‘You are so sensitive,’ someone said to Himmler recently. Of course you know Himmler, Miss Rothwax?”

“You know my name?” Ruth said.

“Of course I know your name,” said Höss. “A name is the easiest thing to know about a person. I was talking, was I not, about Himmler. Heinrich Himmler, Reichsführer-SS, head of the Gestapo and the Waffen-SS. The second most powerful man in Nazi Germany. Sensitive indeed! Just because he is a small man who looks like a bank clerk, they think he is sensitive.” Höss sighed. “Nobody talks to me, here. For years nobody has talked to me. Even my former colleagues pretend that they do not know me.”

Ruth realized that she had been blinking her eyes and tapping her leg rapidly. She wondered if Höss had noticed.

“What is that action you are making with your leg?” Höss said.

“Nothing,” she said. “It’s just a nervous mannerism.” She steadied her leg. “Oh God,” she said. “I have to go. I have to meet my father for breakfast.” She started to walk back to the hotel. She felt surprisingly well.

“God?” Höss said. “Surely you do not believe in God? Not after what you have seen?”

“What did I see?” Ruth said. “I wasn’t there.”

“Sometimes you do not have to be in a place in order to see,” Höss said.

“I think that you know this.”

“That’s absurd,” Ruth said. “I only know a fraction of what happened to my mother and father.”

“You do not have to know everything in order to know that there is no God,” Höss said.

“Funny, that’s what my mother said, ‘There is no God,’ ” said Ruth.

T O O M A N Y M E N

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“If there was a God,” Höss said, “do you think that I would speak about him in this way? Of course I would not. It would ensure that I would never obtain a place in heaven.”

Ruth looked up at the sky. The whole time that she had been talking to Höss she had been looking at her feet.

“You cannot see me,” Höss said to her. “And you will not be able to see me until you come to Zweites Himmel’s Lager. But I do not know if this will be your destination. Maybe you will go to Himmel? And in Himmel, people cannot see into Zweites Himmel’s Lager. In Himmel, people are spared those sights that are too disturbing.”

Ruth looked back down at her feet. Her feet looked just the same. The same as they were before she was involved in this conversation with Rudolf Höss, SS-Obersturmbannführer. Her black and green Nike Air Max shoes were still slightly spotted with mud from her run yesterday in the Saxon Gardens. Her socks were still just socks. Part of her had, briefly, wondered if she had died. She patted her face. Her face was warm, despite the cold.

She felt her hips. They were still the large hips she was always trying to diminish.

“Let me get back to why I lost my faith,” Höss said.

“Maybe I don’t want to hear about it?” Ruth said.

“I think you can be truthful with me,” Höss said. “You want to know about me. I can see it on your face. I had my reasons for choosing you.

Even though I am restless, with not too much to do, in Zweites Himmel’s Lager, I would not waste my time with just anybody. I chose you because I knew that you wanted to know.”

Höss cleared his throat. Ruth found it interesting, that in hell, you still had to clear your throat. It added validity to Höss’s claim that he could still feel his bones. If you couldn’t feel your vocal cords, why would you clear your throat? Höss must be telling the truth about that, she thought.

“I was thirteen years old when I lost my faith in God,” Höss said. “This came about as a result of a completely innocent episode in my life. I accidentally pushed one of the boys in my class, at school, down the stairs and he broke his ankle. You can imagine how many hundreds of schoolboys had fallen, without harming themselves, down those stairs. I myself fell down those very stairs and was not hurt. I was very unlucky that this boy was hurt.”

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L I L Y B R E T T

“I went to confession as I did every week,” Höss said. “Are you listening?”

“I thought you could tell whether I was listening or not,” Ruth said.

“Go ahead, I’m listening.”

“I went to confession,” Höss said, “and I confessed the whole episode of the accident. At home, I said nothing. I didn’t want to spoil my mother’s and father’s Sunday. Coincidentally, the priest that I confessed to happened to be a close friend of my father, and he happened to come to our house for dinner that night.

“The priest, in a betrayal that I could not have dreamed about, told my father about the incident,” Höss said. “My father, of course, punished me.

I was overcome. Quite stricken and brokenhearted. Not from the punishment, but on account of this betrayal.

“My whole faith in the most sacred nature of the priesthood was destroyed,” Höss said. “I could no longer consider the priesthood as being worthy of my trust. I gave up going to confession, completely.”

“It’s just as well you gave up going to confession,” Ruth said.

“Why do you say this?” Höss asked.

“Because your confessions would have been very lengthy. They would have occupied an awful lot of your life.”

“I see what you mean,” Höss said. “From that day I stopped believing that God heard my prayers. My father, I told you, was a devout Catholic.

He always let me know in most adamant terms that he expected me to become a priest. My father died suddenly the year after the school stairs incident. I cannot in fact remember being very much affected by his death.

Soon the war started and I wanted to go to the front. I had soldier’s blood in my veins. I could listen to soldiers’ stories of the front, for hours. I never got bored. My relatives wanted to ship me off to a training college for missionaries. My mother didn’t want me to go to the front; she, too, thought I was destined for the priesthood. But I am an obstinate person, and I finally managed to join the regiment in which my father and my grandfather had served. I was fifteen years old.”