The Ragged Edge of Night(65)
Tuesday is Hitler Youth day. Across the nation, our young people meet on the same day of the week, at the same time of the evening. Order, lockstep, we do as we are told. Compliance and uniformity make us great—that’s what they would have us believe.
Monday: Anton is in Kirchheim, a village not exactly near Unterboihingen, teaching the children of that parish to play the organ. No one in Kirchheim wanted organ lessons, but Father Emil has made the arrangements. Emil has insisted, has worked his influence among the Kirchheim priests—and so every last child in the parish will learn to play. It keeps Anton well clear of Unterboihingen until late into the night, every Monday night.
Wednesday: The buses are always slow, so he tells Frau Müller in Wernau that he must shift the time of her daughter’s piano lessons back to five p.m. He can just catch the last bus back to Unterboihingen; he won’t be home until half past seven.
On Thursday, he volunteers at the bakery, lifting pans for Frau B?sch, whom the children have nicknamed Frau Brotmacher—“bread maker.” The Frau has recently hurt her back, wrestling with an ill-tempered milk cow. If she can’t bake, then our town will have little bread, and we will all be the worse for hunger. Who can do this work, if not Anton? Every other man is busy on Thursdays, by Father Emil’s suggestion. If anyone remembers that Anton injured his own back in the Wehrmacht, no one mentions it now. He is careful to walk straight and unbent, to move without the least impediment, lest anyone recall his aching back and comment on the strange arrangement. He fetches and carries for Frau Brotmacher in the heat of her bakery, sweating through his shirt to his vest, almost until midnight. And so Thursday nights are out of the question.
Friday: He adds three lessons to his roster, with Father Emil beating the hedges and alleys of the parish to scare up more students. The families are among the poorest in Unterboihingen; Anton suspects Father Emil is paying their fees himself, but he won’t shame the parents by asking, nor will he expose Emil to scandal. He accepts the situation for what it is, what he needs it to be: tight commitments that can’t be broken, every Friday until late in the evening.
Every Saturday, he minds the children of the Forst family—eight dirty, ill-behaved brawlers. Both Herr and Frau Forst must work now: he at the train yard, she at the distribution center, sorting our weekly rations. No one is left to care for their brood. Who can do this task, save Anton? No one; there is no one else who can spare the time. That’s what he tells the village, and the village comes to believe it. A dozen different people might have taken to minding the Forst children on Saturdays. Frau Hertz, or Frau B?sch, even with her bad back—Elisabeth herself might have done it, and her stern discipline would have done the Forsts a world of good. But that is not the point. That is not a part of this quiet, careful design.
When his schedule is impossibly full, Anton goes to M?belbauer, hat in hand.
“It has been such a busy winter for us all,” he says to Franke, smiling his pleasant smile, the one that can put anyone at ease, can convince anyone that Anton Starzmann is trustworthy, your dearest friend. “I’m so disappointed, because I’ve been looking forward to leading the Hitler Youth program since you first told me about it. But, well… as you can see…” He passes a paper to M?belbauer: his impossibly tight schedule, scrawled and annotated, marked up, crossed out and rewritten, as if he has made an honest attempt to rearrange his life. As if he tried every conceivable way to accommodate the Führer’s plans.
“I don’t see the problem,” M?belbauer says. “Your Tuesday evenings are free. It’s perfect; Tuesday is Hitler Youth night.”
“It would be youth night, if you only want Unterboihingen to participate in the usual program. If you don’t aspire to anything greater.”
M?belbauer squints up at him. What is the ex-friar talking about?
“I thought, friend—wouldn’t it be something truly special if we were to give a real gift to the Führer?”
M?belbauer waits, pursing his lips below his truncated mustache. Confused and wary, his eyes shift from Anton’s smile to the schedule in his hand.
“We don’t exactly stand out here in Unterboihingen,” Anton says. “Who ever gives us a second thought? Who minds any of us—you included, although you’re a genius furniture maker? Consider for a moment all the talent we have here, concentrated in this town. All the great things we can do—we alone can do. All the ways we can honor the Führer with our gifts.”
“I don’t know what you’re getting at,” M?belbauer says shortly.
“Herr Franke, what would you do—who would you be, how high could you rise—if a man of your quality, with your talents and ambitions, were actually recognized by those who matter? Those with power. Where do you see yourself? There is no limit, as far as I can tell. A good, clear-headed, loyal Party man like yourself… You’re everything the NSDAP wants, everything they look for in an officer or a politician. All you lack is visibility. And who can expect visibility in Unterboihingen?”
M?belbauer stares at Anton openly now, his hunger conspicuous. The force of the man’s craving, the power it has over him, nearly makes Anton step back and throw up his hands in defense. As Father Emil has said, a man ruled by ambition is dangerous. All M?belbauer wants in this world is power—to be recognized, to be feared. Why else has he set himself up as gauleiter, if not to work his way ever closer to the source of power? He says, “Go on.”