Freedom (Jerusalem) Read online

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  Revised edition copyright © 2012 by Colin Falconer

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  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance of fictional characters to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission from the author and publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  Electronic ISBN 9781621250098

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  FREEDOM

  Colin Falconer

  Book II in the Jerusalem series

  the story of how Palestine became Israel

  PART ONE

  GERMANY AND PALESTINE, 1938

  Chapter 1

  Ravenswald, Germany

  The vine leaves on the wall had turned russet-red with the coming of autumn. For the first time in his life Netanel Rosenberg dreaded it. As a child it meant ice-skating and snow-heavy pine branches in the garden; there was Hanukkah, the Feast of Lights, to look forward to and his mother’s warm broths and bird tracks on the lawn like tiny arrows.

  But this year there would only be large, cold rooms and watery Knochensuppe and dread.

  The house was eerily quiet. He was accustomed to hearing the maids opening the shutters in the mornings or Herr Taborski shoveling coke into the boilers in the basement. But now the servants were all gone.

  Mutti prepared all the meals herself. “It is no hardship to me,” she said. “When I was a girl I had to do everything at home. I had five brothers and they were no help at all.”

  It was Netanel’s job to stoke the boilers now but then the coal man refused to make any more deliveries. “I’m sorry, Herr Rosenberg, I really am, but the SA have told me not to sell any more coal to Jews.” With each shovelful their precious black mountain shrank a little more. Soon it would all be gone.

  The factory was gone too, sold. They had been paid one-third of the true value and their buyer had counted himself a generous man to give even that to a family of desperate Jews. A few weeks later the Nazis compounded their humiliation, informing them that they were confiscating their personal bankbooks. They were unable to withdraw the proceeds of the sale from the bank. Overnight Josef Rosenberg, der Chef, the richest man in Ravenswald, became a pauper.

  But what was personal wealth anyway? The Deutschmark had lost ninety per cent of its value on overseas markets in the last year, so their money would have been worthless outside Germany anyway. They had waited too long to get out. For a short time the Haavara Agreement had made it possible for Jews to emigrate to Palestine and take their money with them, but once the Arab rebellion was under way, the British tried to pacify the Arabs by closing off Jewish immigration.

  That escape route was now closed.

  It wasn’t about wealth anymore; now it was just about survival.

  Netanel’s father was a prudent man and had not kept all his money in the bank; he had kept a large amount of cash hidden in a safe inside the house. “I put aside for a rainy day,” he told his wife. “And believe me, it’s pouring right now.”

  They used some of it to buy food; most of it went in bribes to Nazi officials. Every day Josef Rosenberg trudged the streets of München, trying to get visas out of the country for himself and his family; as time went by his efforts became ever more urgent. The news from abroad was all bad; the French and British allowed Hitler to reoccupy the Rhineland, in breach of the Treaty of Versailles; they looked the other way when Hitler sent his tanks and planes to the fascists in Spain. Then, just five weeks ago, they had persuaded the Czechs to allow Hitler to annex the Sudetenland.

  They were sorry, but there was nothing they could do.

  Just like the Rosenbergs’ coal man.

  They sat down to a pauper’s meal of watery boiled potatoes and salted Matjes herring. The room was frigid and they wore their overcoats to the table. They needed to conserve their fuel now, and Netanel would only light the boilers after sunset, when the temperature dropped below freezing.

  Netanel chewed a little fish, without appetite. “I was listening to the radio tonight,” he said.

  Josef nodded. “Not now, Netya.’

  Frau Rosenberg looked up. “Why ‘not now’? What is it?”

  Josef cleared his throat. “A Jewish boy broke into the German embassy in Paris. He shot one of the officials, the Third Secretary. Ernst vom Rath.”

  “Is he dead?”

  “No, but he is very seriously wounded. He may not survive.”

  Frau Rosenberg forked a morsel of herring into her mouth, as if it were lobster. “Good,” she said. “One less Nazi.”

  “You don’t understand,” Josef said. “If he dies there will be serious trouble here. Very serious trouble.”

  “How can things get any more serious than they are?”

  “I admit, it’s hard to imagine,” Josef said. He allowed himself the luxury of a small, tight smile. “Perhaps it’s as well we will not be here to find out if such a thing is possible.”

  Netanel looked up. “What do you mean, Vati?”

  “I have our visas here in my pocket. We are leaving Germany!”

  They stared at him in astonishment. After so long, it scarce seemed possible.

  Frau Rosenberg was first to break the silence. “Where are we going?”

  “Chile!”

  “Chile? South America Chile?”

  “Where else would it be?”

  South America! Netanel imagined himself an impoverished alien in a strange and distant country. But at least this nightmare would be over. At least they would not be prisoner sin their own home; at least it might be warm.

  But it would mean he would never see Marie Helder ever again. A part of him had yet clung to the frail hope of some fairy-tale ending; now he brought that hope to the light and let it die. There were no fairy tales for Jewish boys and German girls in Hitler’s Reich.

  “Chile!” he repeated. “It’s the end of the world.”

  “No, Netanel,” Frau Rosenberg said, looking around at the cold radiators, the salt herrings on their plates, the three of them in their overcoats. “No, this is the end of the world.”

  “We leave in a month,” Josef Rosenberg said.

  “Thank God,’ Netanel said. He supposed he had long given up on Marie Helder; but he was not ready yet to let go of life.

  Chapter 2

  Hermann was listening to Wagner on the radio, Inge was darning socks. The Herrenvolk! Marie Helder thought. Der Führer's ‘master race’. She felt bad for despising them; they had sacrificed so much for her. Or had they? It had been a shock when Hermann announced that his savings had run out, and Marie would not be able to complete her degree. All this talk about educating her, yet now he seemed quite content to have her work behind the counter in his butcher’s shop again.

  It was as if the last three years had meant nothing.

  “We are going to get a new motor car,” Hermann announced.

  “A motor car?” Marie said. “How can you afford such a thing?” When you can’t afford to pay for my degree, as you promised?

  “Der Führer has announced that every German should own a motor car - not just the damned Jews!”

  “Is he going to send us one?”

  Hermann looked up from his edition of Der Stürmer, frowning. “
It is part of a plan. We are paying five marks a week.”

  “As soon as the factory is finished,” Inge said, “we will have our new motor car.”

  “When it is finished? When will that be?”

  “Next year,” Hermann said. “Der Führer has promised.”

  “I shall not sell my bicycle just yet then.”

  Hermann wagged his finger at her but could not think of a suitable retort. The radio announcer interrupted Der Ring des Nibelungen and they fell silent. Third Secretary Ernst vom Rath had died in a Paris hospital. The announcer read a statement from the Berchtesgaden: the Third Reich would not tolerate any more provocation from the Jews. The cowardly assassination of vom Rath, he said, would not go unpunished.

  Hermann nodded. “The Jews have gone too far this time.”

  “Der Führer has been good to them until now,” Inge said. “I think this time they have tried even his patience a little too much.”

  Marie stood up and left the room. She could no longer endure being in the same room with them. Five-mark motor cars and Hitler being good to the Jews! Had they ever stopped to listen to themselves?

  Oh, Netanel, what is going to happen to you?

  Netanel woke to the sound of tires crunching on the gravel driveway. Torchlight swung across the windows. He heard muffled shouts; someone was hammering on the front door.

  Netanel stared at the clock: two in the morning. What was happening? His bedroom door swung open and Josef switched on the light.

  “It’s the SS!” Josef said. His sparse, grey hair was comically awry from sleep.

  Netanel jumped out of bed and put on his dressing- gown. His breath froze in the air. He went to the window. There was an army truck parked in the forecourt. The crashing continued downstairs, it sounded as if there were at least half a dozen of them.

  “What are we going to do?” Josef said.

  “I’ll go,” Netanel said. “Stay here with Mutti.”

  He ran downstairs and across the hall but he was too late to save the lock. The wood splintered and the door flew open. Men in black uniforms rushed through. They were all armed; one of them had used the butt of his rifle to break open the door.

  Their leader ran straight at him and hit him in the face with his fist. Netanel fell backwards and his head smacked on the tiled floor. For a moment he lay on his back, stunned.

  “Stay where you are, Jew.” He knew that voice; it was Rolf Emmerich.

  He struggled to sit up, dazed from the unexpected blow. Rolf’s knee-length shiny leather boots swam in and out of his vision. He heard china smashing, drawers crashing to the floor. Somewhere in the house his mother was screaming.

  “I said, stay where you are!”

  Rolfs boot slammed into his ribs and Netanel collapsed again, choking. Another kick sent a stab of pain through his kidneys.

  “Leave him!” Josef shouted.

  Josef ran down the stairs towards them, but stopped suddenly, his face grey. Rolf had drawn his pistol and was pointing it at his head.

  “Heil Hitler!” It was Weber. He stood in the doorway, flanked by two SS storm troopers.

  “Colonel Weber!” Josef shouted. “Is this how your representatives in Ravenswald behave!”

  “Yes, Herr Rosenberg, it is. I must admit, I am impressed.” Netanel tried to get to his feet, but the room span around him and he slumped to his knees. He retched on the floor.

  Weber looked down at him, disgusted. “Heil Rosenberg," he muttered.

  Rolf laughed.

  The stormtrooopers were at work in the dining-room. They had found the Spode china tea-set in the glass cabinet. It was hand- painted with tiny roses, had belonged to Netanel’s great-grandmother. They were smashing each piece on the floor, one at a time.

  “Look at what these Jews have got,” one of them shouted. “They have everything and we have nothing!”

  His colleague drew his dagger across the portrait of Mandel Rosenberg hanging above the old fireplace, then carved a star of David on to the polished oak surface of the dining-room table.

  “Why are you doing this?” Josef shouted.

  “We are searching for arms,” Rolf said. “If you try to resist us, we will shoot you.”

  “We have no arms! I am a respectable businessman!”

  “You are a Jew, aren’t you? Like the filthy Jew who shot Herr vom Rath.”

  “Pigs!” Netanel gasped. “Nazi pigs - ”

  Rolfs boot smacked into the side of his head and Netanel passed out.

  Josef tried to go to his son but two of Rolf’s men pinned his arms. “Herr Rosenberg,” Weber said, “I have a warrant for your arrest.”

  “Arrest? On what charges? For what crime?’

  “It is Schutzhaft, Herr Rosenberg, protective custody.”

  “Protective custody? The only people I need protecting from is you!”

  “The German population is demanding revenge on you Jews for what you did to Herr vom Rath. We cannot guarantee your safety any longer. You will be taken to the KZ at Dachau for your own protection. If you resist, my men have orders to use force.”

  His wife stood at the top of the steps, screaming. He wanted to comfort her, wanted to go to his son, lying there bleeding over the cold tiles, but he was too numb to move. What will happen to them?

  “My son needs a doctor!”

  They ignored him, dragged him outside into a waiting car. The last sounds he heard as he left the House in the Woods were his wife’s screams as she ran after them and collapsed in the snow.

  Marie woke to the sound of breaking glass.

  She slipped on her dressing-gown and went to the window. There was a truck parked under a streetlight outside Horowitz’s shoe store at the end of Theresienstrasse. Some stormtroopers were clustered outside, and one of them was breaking in the door with the stock of his rifle. The shop window was smashed and a Star of David had been painted on the wall. The paint seeped down the bricks like blood.

  The SS ran inside and moments later Marie heard screams. One of them leaned out of Horowitz’s second-storey window and emptied the feather comforters into the street. Feathers drifted onto the cobbles like snowflakes.

  She saw two figures in dressing-gowns waddle across the street, stepping carefully in their slippers over the shards of glass. They bent down and began to fill two bags with shoes from the smashed display window.

  When they were finished, there were feathers in their hair and on their clothes. They looked almost comic, Marie thought. And she perhaps might have laughed at them but it was her own mother and father and instead she wanted to weep with shame.

  Chapter 3

  Near Rab’allah, Palestine

  Majid steered the Buick up the winding road from Jerusalem, his fist punching the horn. The truck in front of him crawled along the centre of the road, belching black smoke from its exhaust. Majid leaned out of the window.

  “Move over, you flaming bastard!” he shouted, in English, using an expression he had learned from the British officers in their jeeps along the Jaffa Road.

  It was the first days of autumn. In Rab’allah the women would be busy at the grape harvest, the men would be slaughtering sheep, boiling the meat for fat, getting ready for winter. He could see the first sheep fires on the horizon, the smoke smudging the watery blue sky, drifting lazily upwards. Not a breath of wind.

  Majid swerved to the right and raced the truck for the corner. A British army lorry rolled around the bend, coming the other way. He swerved violently in front of the truck, heard the truck driver yell a curse at him - “Son of a whore!” - and the army lorry blared its horn. He grinned and waved. Insha’Allah. Thanks be to Allah, it was ordained that this was not his day to die.

  The road snaked through the Judean hills. He steered one-handed while he shifted through the wavebands on the Buick’s radio. He found Radio Damascus. The oriental music was interrupted every few minutes for hotly delivered news items on the war in Europe. The Mufti’s great friend and ally, Hitler, had invad
ed Poland. Majid had heard of Poland. It was where a lot of the Jews came from.

  He was unsure what to think about this. Perhaps it was a good thing. The Mufti said Hitler was going to get rid of all the Jews for good, and if there were no Jews, Palestine would not have any problems. But what if he did not get rid of them, what if he only chased them out of Poland and they started coming here again? Talbot did not like Hitler, he said he was a troublemaker like the Mufti, and Majid had never known the British to be wrong about things like that.

  He turned off the Jerusalem-Tel Aviv road and headed up a stony track towards Rab’allah. The Buick bumped over potholes and rocks. Majid kept his foot on the accelerator. He wanted to raise the largest possible dust cloud so that everyone in the village would know he was coming, and a suitable welcoming party could be arranged.

  He heard a sharp ping! and looked down. There was a bullet hole in the coachwork no more than six inches from his right knee and an exit hole on the floor between his legs. Someone was shooting at him! He slammed on the brakes and jumped out of the motor car before it had even stopped rolling, throwing himself face down in the dust.

  When he looked up he saw half a dozen men scrambling down the slope towards him, each of them armed with a rifle. He was about to run, then realized he knew one of them. It was Izzat.

  Son of a whore!

  He jumped to his feet. “You dirty little Arab!” he shouted at him as soon as he was within earshot. “May Allah roast your cock slowly on the Day of the Fire!”

  “Majid!” Izzat laughed. “So it’s you! Did we scare you?”

  Majid recognized Izzat’s two companions. They were fellaheen from Rab’allah: one of them paid rents to his father, the other was an idiot from birth and half blind. He spent his days squatting outside his mother’s hut, dribbling. They said when he wiped his ass he licked his fingers dry. And some maniac had let him loose with a gun!