The Trespassers (2 page)

“Today the German university professor,” the Minister had said, “must ask himself one question: ‘Does my scientific work serve the welfare of National Socialism?’ ”

That same labored exhaling then. Part of it was anger, and part a grotesque weary defeat. Defeat for him, for every student, for every scientist, for every free mind.

“
Sieg Heil. Heil Hitler
.” His small, happy son, so independent, so sturdy, so—so decent. Yet so reachable, still, so malleable.

Both children were upon him now, chattering questions and greetings. Christa went into the library and a moment later he had sent the children into the garden and was at her side. He put his hand on her arm. Reassurance. Comfort.

“They will not have time, Christl,” he said. “This is just a child’s aping. For the real thing—we will not give them time. Next week several mail boats are due. The letter must be on one of them.”

And his mind saw the letter, in Ann Willis’ firm, squared American handwriting, with its purplish or blue stamps reading “United States of America”; it was tossed in with a thousand other letters in a canvas mail sack, and that sack with hundreds of other such sacks was now, this very moment, in the hold of some great ship crossing the seas, heading for Cherbourg or Southampton or Bremerhaven. The great turbines were in motion, the commanders were on duty, the watch was alert on the bridge, all was in order and the ships were steadily, pleasantly furrowing the waters of the Atlantic, carrying crates of goods, cases, boxes, carrying sacks of mail.

Somewhere in one of those ships was his letter that spelled the end of an era in his life. How many other such letters did those ships carry?

It seemed to him suddenly that part of him had known as far back as 1933 that the day would come when he too would be waiting for such a letter. That faraway day when they burned the books in Germany—he had known then that the dear world of freedom was going up in that murky smoke. He had known that those brutish flames would lick across every timber in the whole structure of civilized life—so slowly, so laboriously constructed through patient centuries—the whole structure of free thought, free worship, free protest.

He had read of the burning of the books and his own constricted throat told him how the awful ashes of it would clog and choke the very breath of science, of literature, of jurisprudence and teaching. The twentieth century, he thought on that day in 1933, would lie gasping within a decade.

The books, the Reichstag Fire, the first decrees against the Jews, the first dismissals of college professors, the first swooping arrests in the night—each had warned him, in another country, that the holocaust might spread to Austria next. Nor had he ever truly blinded himself into believing that somehow he would escape it, he, Dr. Franz Wilhelm Vederle, for all his scientific position, for all that he was an Aryan—that disgusting and untenable word.

Yes, a part of him had understood, had estimated the future, had acted. Quietly and steadily he had begun, as long ago as 1934, to prepare, financially at least, for the ultimate necessity of flight.

“I must ask something of you,” he would say to every British or American patient, “although it is not—er—classic analytical procedure for the analyst to ask a favor of his patient.”

“Yes, Dr. Vederle? I should be so glad…” How eager the new patient was, to bribe the analyst.

“It will put you to some small trouble. When you pay your bills, will you be so kind as to pay me only half, and to send the rest to a close friend of mine in Basel?”

“Oh, yes, of course, but that is nothing.” The voice was always disappointed. The bribe was too small to be effective.

And now in Switzerland he had a small fortune of some forty thousand Swiss francs. That was comforting in this hazardous new world. He had, too, kept the family papers and passports in order. To that extent he had acted.

But apart from that, he knew that he was deeply unprepared. The other part of his mind, he now thought, sitting alone in his charming small library with the cheery voices of Christa and the children drifting in to him—the other part of his mind had always rejected, refused the image. A hundred thousand people might be fleeing National Socialism and Fascism, a half million, a million, but that harsh necessity will never be
my
necessity. The madness in Germany will pass, the folly of it will lessen, Hitler will be discredited, be assassinated, die—somehow the forces of justice and sanity will regain the upper hand while there is yet time, and then all this brutish attack on human lives, dignity, security will be done. Before it can strike Austria. Before it can strike me and Christa and the children…

The two interlocked yet always warring parts of his mind had spawned forth inertia, the sad, weak progeny of conflict. He was, in this, like so many of his own patients. Like some woman in love with a man who consistently hurt her, gave her only pain and shock, yet whom she could not seem to give up. Such a woman could feel clearly that the future was hopelessly doomed between her and her lover, yet at the same time cling to the fantasy, the hope that something would occur, something would change the pattern, and then all would be peace and joy. Such a woman never could take the decisive step. The dream vanquished the reality.

In the same way, he was enmeshed in a love fantasy. He was in love, not only with his life in Vienna. But also he was in love with the dream that reason and decency would triumph before it was forever too late, before the problem became his own personal problem.

So far the dream had conquered.

Once every so often, in the passing months and years, there came a specific act strong enough to pierce that continuing hope. That night in February, 1934, when little Dollfuss struck out against the workers, when he and Fey and the Heimwehr under Prince Starhemberg began virtual civil war against forty per cent of the people “to make a clean breast of things in Austria.”

That night he had seen the inescapable future. What had happened to lull him again? Ilse was ill, she was the merest infant then—ah, yes, his anxieties were channeled toward her. Time passed, and then in June came the purges in Berlin and everyone said this was the first real rift, the Nazi ranks would crack soon, the worst fanaticism would disappear…

The Nazi murder of Dollfuss, their seizure of the Chancellory and the radio station—that rocked him as it did all Austrians. But once again, the terrible rhythm of renewed hope. Schuschnigg and Miklas seemed to maintain control. Perhaps the coup had really failed. Austria, after all, was not Prussia; Austrians, after all, were civilized, tolerant, humane people…

Always, always, part of his mind seeing, estimating, hearing the roar of the onrushing tide. But always, always, it would ebb again, leaving enough confusion to starve the will, to nourish the dream.

February, 1938, little more than a month ago, and Schuschnigg in secret meeting with Hitler at Berchtesgaden. Ah,
then
the beating heart, the thrusting sense of time lost, of the inactive months and years.

Since then, only a mounting progression of anxious hours and days. Schuschnigg and Miklas surrendered to the demands of the “Berchtesgaden Agreement.” There was a new cabinet, Nazi Seyss-Inquart was Minister of the Interior. There was amnesty for all Nazi prisoners. There would be a plebiscite—free will, free choice, in the true spirit of democracy. The class of 1915 was called up. Everywhere were fearful whisperings about invasion, the German Reichswehr would march, was marching. Mobs of young Austrian Nazis sang and howled in the streets.
Sieg Heil, Sieg Heil, Sieg Heil—Heil Hitler.

And then came the eleventh of March.

Dr. Vederle knew then, knew that day, that years must pass before any March 11 could become just a simple, sunny day again, rather than the bitter tombstone of Austria’s past.

On Friday, March 11, 1938, the Reichswehr marched. The plebiscite was ordered off by Berlin the master; the whole people clung to the wireless, heard rumor, report, counterreport, snatches of song, Viennese waltzes, too poignant now to be borne, heard at last that “
Achtung, Achtung—
an important announcement coming.”

Then for breathless seconds only the tick-tick-tick of the metronome that was Ravag’s station identification. Tick-tick-tick; gone-gone-gone—

Then Schuschnigg’s voice: “The German Government today handed President Miklas an ultimatum…we have yielded to force…God protect Austria…”

God protect Austria. The next morning sudden swastikas flew from every building, laughing, swaggering young Nazis swarmed the streets, hurled bricks and stones through the windows of Jewish shops, tossed down steins of beer in the great gulps of celebrating victors.

God protect Austria. Already on that first day, the smell of danger, of persecution and political slavery, was in the nostrils.

That same day, two Jewish families in the Vederles’ own circle of friends left: the Wolffs, bound for the safety of Holland, the Markheimers for France. Franz and Christa took them to the station. Their
Auf Wiedersehen’s
were hollow, full of restraint on both sides. Only little Editha Wolff, aged five, told what was in the heart to be told.

“But I don’t
want
to go anywhere; please let’s go home, it’s better at home than
anywhere.
”

The next day Franz went to a special board meeting of the Vienna Psychoanalytical Society. It was Sunday afternoon, and the meeting took place in Freud’s apartment, amid the old plush furniture of the ’90’s when he had first moved into the Berggasse. The members showed, quite realistically, tension and unease. They knew well the Nazi attitude toward psychoanalysis, the science that dealt with men’s minds, that was an hourly rebuttal of the new myths of racism and
Blut.
Besides, many of the members were Jews. Sigmund Freud himself—would he now, like Einstein in Germany…?

At the end of the meeting, Freud came in, old and fragile and calm. Anna Freud told him of the board’s decision, that even in migration each member of the Viennese Society would go on being a member of this Society until he were able to practice elsewhere, and join some other. She told him that the board had voted that the seat of the Society would always be wherever Freud was, and had asked him to remain its President. He agreed, and then he spoke. In his low, somewhat husky voice, he offered some final words to these men who would carry on their work in other lands.

“Immediately after the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem by Titus,” he said, his fine long hands quiet instead of moving in their usual deft gestures, “Rabbi Jochanan ben Zakkai asked for permission to open at Jabne the first school for the study of the Torah. That is what we will do with our science—we will carry it elsewhere, where there is still freedom.” He spoke on briefly, and then left the room once more. But at the door, he turned and said, “Hold fast to the truth.”

Franz, like the others, knew that it was probably the last time he would see and hear this great man, and the sounds of his final words stirred deep and warm in his heart throughout the rest of the day and night.

On Monday morning, Vienna woke to the sure feeling that the German army was near. German soldiers, German S.S. men were everywhere. Hundreds of airplanes flew low over the city, roaring through the early spring sunshine, casting incessant shadows. In the trees and bushes, the birds started up anxiously; in the streets and gardens, the children were disturbed and apprehensive.

From his office, Franz drove to the University, where he was an associate professor. Many of his printed papers were there, as well as some work in progress, still in manuscript form. They would be safer in his own study at home.

The head of the department was leaving the building.

“
Heil Hitler
,” the professor of psychiatry greeted Franz.

There was a pause. Men taking each other’s measures.

“
Guten Abend
,” Vederle replied at last. The other’s eyelids drew together. Antagonism stood instantly between them. So quickly were the lines to be drawn?

“This is a good time for you,” the professor went on. “There will be many vacancies at once. The Jew cowards will run fast. It will be easy now for you to attain a full professorship.”

“I suppose it would be.”

Shaken with anger, he went inside and speedily put his papers together. Outside again in half an hour, he found the early twilight of middle March already softening and blurring outlines of buildings, trees. The wind fell away, the daylight withdrew, quietly, patiently. Only, overhead, the sky was efficient with the steady roar of the German planes, the red and green lights on their wing tips like swift, colored meteors in some new astronomy.

Homebound, he found himself passing police headquarters. Impulsively he went in.

“Are the borders still open? I am Dr. Vederle of the University. May a citizen travel without special permission?”

“Still open,
Herr Doktor.
Except,
naturlich,
for Jews.”

At home, the children leaped upon him in all their untouched delight. They were so unaware, unknowing, free of doubt and fear.

No scenes of brutality had assaulted their young eyes as yet, no frightened whispering in the night their ears. When they went up to bed, he as well as Christa followed to say good night. He kept his voice casual, friendly, answered Paul’s incessant questions about ordinary things in his ordinary tone. Only, when he leaned down to kiss Ilse’s scrubbed, shining little girl’s face, he kissed her with a new vehemence. Some savage, determined protectiveness stirred deeply in him.

“What’s the matter, Daddy?” she asked in her sweet, high voice. “Is something the matter?”

The same sweet, high voice of little Editha Wolff at the station. “But I don’t
want
to go anywhere…”

“Nothing’s the matter, silly child,” he said. “Oh, with the world, yes, but not for us.” And at the reassuring sound of his love, Ilse smiled at him and cuddled herself into a drowsy crescent.

Downstairs again, Christa turned to him. Her face was grave; her blue eyes were steady and curiously stilled.