Shoes

Too many pairs of shoes.1

Too many lives. 2

Can we imagine?3

Arnulf Fleischer stumbles out of the camp at the end of a hard day’s work, the smell of human meat pasted stubbornly on his nostrils and on his heart, his face grey and strained. He passes the mountains of shoes on either side of him blindly, wishing for a little liqueur to ease his way. On his way home, he calls in at the local shop to pick up chocolate for his little daughter, Grete, trying not to remember the baby he had to smash against the wall today. The mother wouldn't let it go. He doesn't blame her. He doesn't know how they cope with that grief. He couldn't.4

It's hard, this job. He can't wait to be out of it. 5

At home, his wife greets him gently, and Arnulf tries not to see her wince at the smell lingering on him. 'How are you?' She asks. Arnulf grunts. He is quiet through dinner, and declines to play with Grete, hurrying to bed as soon as they have all finished their meal.6

In the morning, he peers over the edge of a great pit, trying to harden his heart. The tangled limbs of a thousand naked corpses, skin stretched tight with hunger, are piled high. He has shot many of them, and is now pouring lime over them to speed up their decay. A line of new prisoners are waiting, in line, to be executed. Patiently, like its some queue for the grocers. Like they’re not just about to be thrown into a mass grave on top of the bodies of thousands of their friends. Like they haven’t been starved, robbed, stripped of their clothing and herded up here like lambs to the slaughter. Before, Arnulf had never really understood that phrase. 7

At least he isn’t in charge of the ovens today. That’s always worse, somehow. The way it’s like cooking meat for supper, or something. The stink is worse there, too. And the way they make the Jews are forced to shove in their own friends, and shut the door on them. 8

Or the trains.  The one way track carrying the plump, happy human beings.  The one thing that hits him then is way there are always more to come - he is helping in the elimination of a complete race.9

Once his shift is over, Arnulf walks through the camp towards food hall. There aren’t many Jews about today; the diseases are spreading, and most people are stuck in their over-crowded huts, with diarrhoea or typhoid. Arnulf has been inside those huts. He thinks it’s inhumane. Five men crammed on one skinny bed, and those tiered three beds high. One small bucket in the corner, always overflowing, stinking, constantly being emptied outside the door. Most men lying immobile. The others having to crawl over each other to reach the bucket. Human mess everywhere. And the faces changing everyday, as each group is sent to the chambers.10

But it’s good that there aren’t many around today. He can never look them in the eye, especially the children. The young girls, pretty, and so much like his own Grete it scares him. The teenagers, fresh and innocent and good-looking. 11

Arnulf knows that he will soon see them as cargo, shipped out here and killed. He’s seen it in his friends, the change, when they stop thinking of the Jews as normal people: people who once worked, eat and slept just like they do now; who had families; had jobs and lives. They forget their philosophies, and abandon themselves to the killing, and the sport of it. He’s seen his best mates, good men to the last of them, kick old women, and shoot children, with smiles on their faces. The doctors, as well - good, kind doctors in normal circumstance - carrying out experiments on the Jews as if they were animals. All sorts. He has seen twins, sewn together, women forced to be impregnated by their own brothers, men with deliberately inflicted wounds infected with wood shavings or dirty glass. He has seen Jews trapped in low-pressure chambers, Jews left to freeze. 12

Arnulf dreads that change, that slippery way to insanity. He can’t bear to think of what will happen to him. Already, he has no words. He is sick of seeing the mountains of corpses, the tortuous mess of arms and legs. The bones. The live people living in the camps never have any fat on them by the time they are killed; they are just skin and awful bones, so ridiculously angular. Like sticks. He is fed up of seeing that awful transformation, from the plump, live, hopeful beings arriving at the camp to the broken souls shuffling destitute into the chambers of death. With half a heart he can’t wait for the change to happen, so that he can get away from the pain of it all.13

Now, he can’t escape it. The masses of shoes, bags, glasses, clothes, piled up on every corner, the dead men lying in doorways – all constant reminders of where he is. He can’t help thinking of what it would be like if it was the other way round – the Jews killing the Germans. Of his beautiful wife stripped of every ounce of self-respect. Of Grete, smashed against the wall and dripping blood onto his hands. 14

Once he had seen a Jewish woman on the outskirts of the camp. She had obviously had some kind of experiment done to her, and was doubled over in pain. Arnulf had walked over to her, and held out a hand to help her up. She had spat at him, and cried, ‘Get off me, you German dog!’ He had hated that: it had made him want to kill her on the spot, which scared him. But he had hated the way her striking dark eyes had filled with tears, too. And he had hated shoving her into the gas chambers the next day.15

It’s too much; he is fed up of following orders now.16

At home, his wife is concerned. As she takes his jacket, she asks him, ‘What’s wrong? You look awful!’ Arnulf shrugs. How does a man tell his loved ones that he has lost all hope in humanity? It was in times like these that he wished he believed in a God to help him through. ‘Nothing,’ he replies, ‘Just a little tired. Where’s my darling daughter?’ He kisses them both, giving a false laugh, ignoring the crematorium chimney through the window. 17

When they are in bed, Arnulf whispers to his wife. ‘If anything happens to me, dear, you would go to your mother in Berlin, wouldn’t you? You’d stay safe?’ She reassures him. ‘Nothing with happen! Silly.’ She laughs, confused, and kisses him fondly. 18

He has nightmares until dawn, when he wakes up, shuffling into his uniform, ready for an early start.19

When he arrives at the camp, his heart hardened as much as a heart can, he searches for his friends. They are standing over a young Jewish woman, drinking out of their flasks, staggering about her and taunting her with rude gestures. Her frail shoulders are slipping out of her dirty rags, and her hair is shorn. One man grabs at her, and her dress rips, exposing her wasted breasts. She cries out, and tries to cover herself. Arnulf is tossed a bottle. He takes a swig, enjoying the burning liquid, then smashes it, watches the girl flinch away from the shards of glass.  He joins in the laughter - She’s only cargo, anyway.20

Later, he borrows a sharp dagger from his a friend of his. He begins the tramp home, toiling down the dusty road. 21

He calls in at the local shop to pick up chocolate for Grete, noticing how the polish woman behind the counter regards him with fear. He opens the door to his home and almost wretches at the smell of meat. He kisses his wife, and pets her when she remarks on his slack face. He feeds Grete the chocolate. He forces himself to eat. He kisses his wife after tea, and then runs himself a hot bath. He strips, throws his uniform on the floor, and rummages in the pockets for the dagger, which he lays on the side of the bath. He lowers himself in to the scalding water, and grips the dagger. He turns off the light, slits his wrists quietly, and slips into the welcome dark.22

Three weeks afterwards, the camp is liberated and many of the workers, all innocent men, are sent home.23