The Woman from Hamburg Read online

  Praise for

  The Woman from Hamburg

  and Other True Stories

  “The rich vibrancy of Jewish life in Polish villages and towns—and the horror of its extermination—are made real all over again … Invaluable.”

  —KIRKUS REVIEWS (starred review)

  “[Krall] reports the basic facts but adds a novelistic twist, weaving her interviews into elegant, multilayered narratives. In Madeline G. Levine’s subtle translation, Krall’s deceptively artless prose speaks of real events with the power of fiction.”

  —THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW

  “The stories weave together as Krall makes connections among the people she interviewed. It is important to remember that these stories are not fiction, or even fictionalized. They are profiles, interviews, and biographies. The man with the bullet in his jaw? He’s real. Krall’s conversation with a Buddhist monk who used to be a Jew? It happened. Every person described in this book existed, and deserves to be counted.”

  —THE BOSTON GLOBE

  “[Krall’s] stories combine the promiscuous warmth of folktales—where entire communities are on intimate terms—with objective reportage.”

  —THE NEW YORK SUN

  “Hanna Krall never disappoints. With her keen and probing journalist’s eye, she explores the unlit byways of the human character as she follows the bizarre postwar life trajectories of a host of well-known and unknown persons. As fascinating as they are troubling, these tales shine a bright light on the never-ending reverberations of the Holocaust.”

  —DEBÓRAH DWORK, Rose Professor of Holocaust History, Clark University

  “Braiding history with imagination, [Krall] produces necessary accounts that incisively unveil and interrogate the ruptured historical legacy of Jews after WWII.”

  —PUBLISHERS WEEKLY

  This publication has been subsidized by Instytut Książ—the ©POLAND Translation Programme

  Copyright © 1994, 1995, 1996, 2001 by Hanna Krall

  Originally published as TANIEC NA CUDZYM WESELU (“Ta z Hamburga,” “Fantom bólu,” “Portret z kulą w szczęce,” “Tylko żart,” “Dno oka”) and DOWODY NA ISTNIENIE (“Dybuk,” “Fotel,” “Lis,” “Drzewo,” “Zbawienie,” “Hamlet,” “Decyzja”)

  Translation copyright © 2005 Madeline G. Levine

  Production Editor: Robert D. Hack

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from Other Press LLC, except in the case of brief quotations in reviews for inclusion in a magazine, newspaper, or broadcast. For information write to Other Press LLC, 2 Park Avenue, 24th Floor, New York, NY 10016. Or visit our Web site: www.otherpress.com.

  The Library of Congress has cataloged the printed edition as follows:

  Krall, Hanna

  The woman from Hamburg and other true stories / by Hanna Krall; translated by Madeline G. Levine.

  p. cm

  eISBN: 978-1-59051-644-7

  1. Holocaust, Jewish

  (1939-1945)–Biography. 2. Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945)–Anecdotes. 3. World War, 1939-1945–Biography. 4. World War, 1939-1945–Anecdotes. 5. Holocaust survivors—Biography. 6. Jews—Biography. I. Levine, Madeline G. II. Title.

  D804.3.K724 2005

  940.53′18′092–dc22

  2004022648

  v3.1

  CONTENTS

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  from Dancing at Someone Else’s Wedding

  The Woman from Hamburg

  Phantom Pain

  Portrait with a Bullet in the Jaw

  Only a Joke

  The Back of the Eye

  from Proofs of Existence

  The Dybbuk

  The Chair

  A Fox

  The Tree

  Salvation

  Hamlet

  The Decision

  About the Authors

  Dancing at Someone Else’s Wedding

  The Woman from Hamburg

  1

  Their home was far away. They were incredibly sociable; they danced throughout Carnival. They liked horse races and gambled enthusiastically, though (of course) in moderation. They were resourceful and thrifty. He was a master painter; he had worked hard and acquired his own firm and three apprentices. Commonplace jobs, like painting walls, he entrusted to his apprentices; sign painting he reserved for himself, especially if the signs included many letters. He was in love with letters. It was their shape that enchanted him. He could spend hours sketching ever more artistic symbols. Sometimes they were sad because they had no children, but they would soon cheer up—they had each other. All of this was a long time ago.

  2

  They had turned thirty right before the war broke out.

  The war didn’t change their life, except that they stopped dancing and new words appeared on their signs. Now, they had orders for warnings. First in Polish: UWAGA! ZAKAZ WJAZDU! Then in Russian: BHИMAHИE! BЪEЗД ЗAΠPEШËH! Then in German: ACHTUNG! EINTRITT VERBOTEN!

  One winter evening, in 1943, he brought home a stranger, a woman.

  “This woman is a Jew. We have to help her.”

  His wife asked if anyone had seen them in the stairwell, and quickly made some sandwiches.

  The Jewess was petite, with curly black hair, and although her eyes were blue, she looked very Semitic. They put her in a room with a wardrobe. (Wardrobes and Jews—this is, perhaps, one of the most important symbols of our century. To live in a wardrobe—a human being in a wardrobe. In the middle of the twentieth century. In the heart of Europe.)

  The Jewess would go into the wardrobe whenever the doorbell rang, and since her hosts continued to be very sociable, she spent long hours inside it. Fortunately, she was a sensible woman. She never coughed; not even the slightest rustling issued from the wardrobe.

  The Jewess was never the first to speak, and she responded to questions with the fewest possible words.

  “Yes, I did.”

  “Attorney.”

  “In Bełżec.”

  “We didn’t have time to; we got married right before the war.”

  “They were taken away. I don’t know, in Janowska or else in Bełżec.”

  She did not expect sympathy. On the contrary, she rebuffed it.

  “I am alive,” she would say. “And I intend to remain alive.”

  She would watch intently as the wife (whose name was Barbara) ironed or stood beside the stove. Occasionally, she tried to help her, but did so with irritating clumsiness.

  She would watch intently as the husband (whose name was Jan) practiced drawing his letters.

  Once, she said, “You might practice with something more interesting.”

  “For example?”

  She gave it some thought.

  “What about this: ‘Once upon a time there lived Elon lanler liron//Elon lanla bibon bon bon …’ ”

  This was the first time they had heard the Jewess laugh, and they both looked up.

  “What’s that?” they asked, surprised, and the woman, animated, continued reciting.

  “ ‘Once upon a time there lived Liron elon lanler//Lanlanler lived in the world.…’ Do you see how many splendid letters it contains? It’s by Julian Tuwim, ‘An Old French Ballad,’ ” she added.

  “Too many L’s,” Jan objected. “But I can write OLD FRENCH.” And he bent over his sheet of paper.

  “Couldn’t that Jewess learn to peel potatoes?” his wife asked him that night.

  “The Jewess has a name,” he replied. “You should refer to her as Regina.”


  One summer day, the wife came home from shopping. Her husband’s jacket was hanging in the anteroom; he had come home from work a little earlier than usual. The door to the Jewess’s room was locked.

  One autumn day her husband said, “Regina is pregnant.”

  Barbara put down her knitting needles and smoothed out her work. It was the sleeve of a sweater, or maybe its back.

  “Now listen to me,” her husband whispered. “I don’t want any stupid ideas entering your head. Do you hear me?”

  She heard him.

  “Because if something should happen …”

  He bent over his wife’s head and whispered straight into her ear.

  “If something bad should happen to her, the same thing will happen to you. Do you understand me?”

  She nodded—she understood him, and she took up her needles.

  A couple of weeks later, she entered the Jewess’s room and, not saying a word, removed a small pillow from the bed. She undid the seam on one side and shook out a small amount of down. She sewed ribbons onto two sides. She concealed the pillow under her skirt. She tied the ribbons behind her and, for extra measure, secured them with safety pins, then pulled on a second skirt over the first.

  A month later she added some down, and began complaining to her neighbors about her nausea.

  Next, she cut a large pillow in half.

  As the Jewess’s belly grew bigger, she enlarged her pillows and let out her skirts—for the Jewess and for herself.

  A trusted midwife attended the birth. Fortunately, labor didn’t last long, despite the fact that the Jewess was narrow in the hips and her water had broken the day before.

  Barbara took the pillows out from under her skirts and, with the baby in her arms, paid visits to all her neighbors. They kissed her tenderly.

  “At last,” they said. “It came late, but the good Lord had mercy on you.”

  Filled with happiness and pride, she thanked them.

  On May 29, 1944, Barbara and Jan took the baby and went to the parish church with a couple of friends. (“Archdiocese of Lwów, Latin rite, the parish of St. Mary Magdalene,” was inscribed on the certificate signed by Father Szogun and stamped with an oval seal: “Officium Parochia, Leopoli.” In the center of the seal was a heart from which emanated the sacred flame.) That evening, they held a modest reception. Because of the curfew, the guests stayed until morning. The Jewess spent the entire night in the wardrobe.

  On July 27, 1944, the Russians entered the city.

  On July 28th, the Jewess disappeared.

  The three of them stayed put: Barbara, Jan, and a three-month-old, blue-eyed baby with fine black curls.

  3

  They were repatriated to Poland in one of the first transports.

  They settled in Częstochowa. (One of Regina’s prewar acquaintances had told them that she had distant relatives there.)

  As soon as they entered the apartment, Jan dropped his suitcase, laid the child down, and ran out of the house.

  The next day, he went out at dawn.

  He searched for her for days on end. He wandered the streets, stopped in at offices, inquired about Jewish apartments, approached people who looked Jewish. He gave up his search only after a visit from two men who introduced themselves as Regina’s emissaries. They offered a large sum and asked the couple to give the baby back.

  “Our daughter is not for sale,” Barbara and Jan said, and saw their guests out.

  Their daughter was a well-behaved and very pretty little girl.

  Her father spoiled her. They went together to sporting events, to the movies, and to cafés. At home, he would talk about how people admired her beauty, especially her hair, which hung down to her waist and was twisted into French curls.

  When Helusia was six, packages began to arrive. They were sent from Hamburg; the sender was a woman with a strange, foreign name.

  “She’s your godmother,” Barbara explained. “I don’t wish her an easy death, but write her a letter and thank her nicely.”

  At first, Helusia dictated her letters; later, she wrote them herself.

  “Thank you, dear Aunt, I am doing well at school, I am dreaming about a white sweater, maybe angora, but mohair would be better.”

  In the next package, a white sweater would arrive.

  Helusia was ecstatic, but Barbara sighed and said, “If there is a God, she won’t have an easy death. Sit down and write a letter. You can mention your First Communion and that white taffeta would come in handy.”

  Sometimes there were banknotes in the packages. There were never any letters; just once, between two chocolate bars, there was a photograph. It showed a dark-complexioned woman in a black dress, with a long fox fur draped over her shoulder.

  “That’s a silver fox,” Barbara observed. “She’s not very poor.”

  But they didn’t get a good look, because Jan took the photograph out of their hands and hid it somewhere.

  Helusia didn’t like her father’s rapturous moods. They were exhausting. She would be studying or playing with her friends, and he’d be sitting there and looking at her. Then he’d take her face between his hands and look again. And then he would start crying.

  He stopped drawing artistic letters.

  He began drinking.

  He cried more and more often, he drank more and more, and then he died. But before he died, a couple of months before his death, Helusia was leaving for France. She was twenty-five years old. A girlfriend had invited her so that Helusia could calm her frazzled nerves after her recent divorce. Helusia came home one day, radiant, holding a passport in her hand. Her father was drunk. He studied the passport and embraced her.

  “Stop over in Germany,” he said. “Pay a visit to your mother.”

  “Your godmother,” Barbara corrected him.

  “Your mother,” her father said again.

  “My mother is sitting next to me and smoking a cigarette.”

  “Your mother lives in Hamburg,” said her father, and burst into tears.

  4

  She changed trains in Aachen.

  She arrived in Hamburg at seven in the morning. She left her suitcase at the station and purchased a map. She waited in a little square, and at nine she stood in front of the gate of a large house in a quiet, elegant neighborhood. She rang the bell.

  “Wer ist das?” she was asked from behind the locked door.

  “Helusia.”

  “Was?”

  “It’s Helusia, open up.”

  The door opened. She saw herself standing there on the threshold: Helusia, but with black hair pinned high on her head, with blue eyes and a too full chin. Helusia, only somehow astonishingly aged.

  “Why did you come?” the woman asked.

  “To see you.”

  “Why?”

  “I wanted to see my mother.”

  “Who told you?”

  “My father.”

  A maid brought in tea. They were sitting in the dining room, amid white furniture with tiny painted flowers.

  “It’s true. I gave birth to you,” her mother said.

  “I had to. I had to agree to everything.

  “I wanted to live.

  “I don’t want to remember your father.

  “I don’t want to remember those times.

  “I don’t want to remember you, either.”

  Her mother paid no attention to Helusia’s sobbing, which was growing louder and louder; she just kept repeating the same few sentences over and over.

  “I was afraid.

  “I had to live.

  “You remind me of my fear.

  “I don’t want to remember.

  “Don’t ever come here again.”

  5

  Helusia got married again, to an Austrian—a quiet, rather boring owner of a mountain inn near Innsbruck.

  On the anniversary of her father’s death, she came back to Poland. She went to the cemetery with her mother. (Barbara was still her mother; she referred to the wom
an who had given birth to her as “The Woman from Hamburg.”)

  Over tea, Barbara told her, “When I die, you will find everything in the drawer with the lids.”

  Helusia bridled at this; then she confessed that she was pregnant and a little afraid of giving birth.

  “You have nothing to be afraid of!” Barbara exclaimed. “I was older than you, and even skinnier, and my water broke too early, but I had no trouble giving birth to you.”

  Helusia was terrified, but Barbara was behaving completely normally.

  “Should I notify The Woman from Hamburg when the baby is born?”

  “Do as you like. That woman caused me a lot of grief, but do as you like.”

  Barbara grew pensive. “My God, how happy we were without her! How gay! If it weren’t for her, we would have been happy for the rest of our lives.”

  If it weren’t for her, you wouldn’t have me, Helusia thought, but she could not say this to her mother, who had given birth to her without any difficulty, despite being old and skinny.

  6

  In the drawer that Helusia opened after Barbara’s funeral, there were two large envelopes among the pot covers. In one of them was a packet of hundred-mark banknotes. In the other was a notebook divided into two columns: “Date” and “Amount.” Barbara had set aside and recorded every banknote that had been sent from Hamburg.

  Helusia bought long silver-fox furs with the money. She sewed a black dress to go with them, but it turned out that the fox furs were poorly prepared, they shed, and they didn’t go with black at all.

  7

  Several months after her second wedding, she had told her husband about her two mothers. She didn’t know German yet. She knew what the word for “wardrobe” was: Schrank. “Pillow,” Kissen, she also knew. “To hide” she found in the dictionary: verstecken. “Fear,” also in the dictionary: Angst.

  When she told the story the second time, to her twenty-year-old son, she already knew all the words. Despite this, she was unable to answer several obvious questions: Why didn’t Grandma Barbara throw Grandpa out? Why did Grandma Regina run away without you? Does Grandma Regina not love you at all?