Читать книгу Three Tearless Histories - Erich Hackl - Страница 15

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ON NOVEMBER 10 & 11 we were imprisoned. In Sinai’s furniture shed. With all the Jews of Floridsdorf, from 2 years old to 100. 2 days without food and with nowhere to sleep. But hard work for all that. We had to unload 4 furniture vans with our own things. Even Liesl’s bookshelf had been unscrewed and taken down. And when she quietly asked how they’d managed it, she’d always wondered, they were almost going to hit her. But Michel’s sister gave one of them such a lovely smile, he didn’t bother. I started crying uncontrollably when I saw all our dear, lovely things gathered there. I didn’t know what I was starting with my tears. All the women began to sob, the SA bellowed, “Stop it!” It was horrible. The raging hunger as well. And I already had a police record, on the same day I’d already been arrested by the police. And I spent an hour in the freezing cold of the loft before they found me at 7 in the morning. They arrested Mommy and Liesl at 4 but didn’t find me then.—They grabbed all our clothes, all our money, in fact everything. The next day (11/11) they let us out. Mom went to an attorney (our house had already been sold, the preliminary contract signed and that was the day when we should have gotten the money) so Mom went to the one who’d arranged the sale. In the meantime Liesl and I borrowed 1 reichsmark from Aryans and went to the Gildemeester Organization. “A bathroom please!” We dashed in shouting that, we were so filthy. “We don’t keep office hours.” So away we went. I was so hungry I couldn’t see properly. Two days is no joke. At least they let us wash our hands at the Jewish Community Center. The youth welfare worker gave us 5 reichsmarks and then she called me back in: “Evi, your visa’s arrived.” She even had the letter in her hand. I showed myself duly pleased, and there was I thinking my passport had been confiscated. And I had no idea where it could be. Then we bought a huge salami sandwich. And ate it as we went up Rotenturmstrasse to the Gildemeester. There we met Kurt Nagler (at the moment he’s in Dover Camp) and he bought us something to eat. Fruit, rolls, even liqueur chocolates. We stuffed ourselves and were glad that under his aegis we got into the bathroom. And we found something decent to sit on. We were almost happy. But with all the agitation and lack of sleep my eyes were funny and made everything look as if it was shimmering. We wanted to spend the night in the office rooms. We’d already lost Mommy. At 8 o’clock the senior officials threw us out and we stood, sobbing, in St. Stephen’s Square with the pleasant prospect of spending the whole night walking round. But then Kurtl took us in, slept in the office himself and in the morning Frau Überall found us and invited us to her place. Two could also sleep there. We drew lots and I lost. So I went out to look for somewhere. There was one empty bed at Franzl Schnitzer’s and we went to the Überalls’ for all our meals. (I think Mommy’s still there but they must be in great financial difficulties because of the contribution.⁴ From us they’re demanding the paltry sum of 30,000. Mommy doesn’t even have 1%.) Then one of the Gestapo, who works at the Gildemeester Organization, got our passports back for us. Two days later we learnt that the visa is also valid for Liesl. But, of course, now we had no money for the tickets. Application to Gildemeester. OK, that won’t be necessary with the Jewish Community Center. Queuing for a visa was 24 hours in the rain outside the English Consulate. Liesl was bleeding under her toenails. That’s what it was like. Then Gildemeester ran out of money the day before. With great wire-pulling and 8 hours queuing we got the tickets and left Vienna the next day. Very tearlessly.

4. The ‘contribution’, amounting in total to 1.2 billion reichsmarks, imposed on Jews as compensation for the damage caused during the Kristallnacht pogrom.