Read Online Playing for Time by Fania Fénelon - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Fania Fénelon
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air of a greedy peasant, Clara asked me: “Since you’re not eating it, will you give me your margarine?”
Poor girl, her need to eat was so violently animal it frightened me.
“Of course, take it!”
That earned me the warm, grateful look of a spoiled cocker spaniel.
Gripping her steaming mug in both hands, Florette growled: “It gets more disgusting every day—and what do they make this bread with? Baked bones, to look at it! It’s just incredible.”
What seemed incredible to me was to hear that phrase here of all places, but no one reacted. Flora smiled vaguely; perhaps she didn’t even grasp the allusion. There was something utterly bovine about her that irritated me. Freckled Jenny tapped her piece of bread on the wooden table and joked: “Anyhow, no need for a hammer to resole your shoes. They mixed up the tradesmen: it’s not Fritz the baker who delivered the bread, but the ironmonger, Fritz the do-it-yourself man.”
I capped it. “You’re right, it’s even hard enough to smash Hitler’s head in.”
Enormous laughter, out of all proportion to the sally. Only Germans and Poles looked disapproving; as they didn’t understand, they always thought they were the butt of our jokes.
“That’s some idea!” Anny roared. “To kill Hitler with his own bread! It would be poetic justice, all right!”
There was a final chortle, then, one by one, we left the room.
Arbeit, Arbeit!
The players tuned their instruments. Seated at the copyists’ table, I took stock of my assistants. It wasn’t a brilliant array—they were the rejects: Zocha, the enormous creature who had come to fetch me in the first place, a hefty country girl who was such an appalling violinist that Tchaikowska, her protector, had speedily relegated her to the copyists’ table when Alma arrived. Danka, something of an athlete and probably the most dangerous because her hard expression showed intelligence; when she wasn’t copying, she played the cymbals literally fit to deafen you, feeling no doubt that the violence of her clashing alone would stir the work detachments into action, that by her zeal she was satisfying the SS. Between these two assertive monsters was Marisha, aged twenty, so pale and self-effacing as to be virtually invisible; even her stupidity was of the washed-out variety. At the other end—here, too, Aryan oil and Jewish water weren’t mixed—Hilde bent her obstinate, freshly shaven head over her paper. Intelligent, tyrannical, she immediately struck me as the führer of the German Jews of our block.
Pointing out my copyists to me, Alma had reminded me that she was the one in charge of them. What power could I wield over those Aryan Poles or over Hilde, who felt superior because she was German? I was a tamer without a whip, naked among vicious beasts. A charming prospect!
Alma appeared at the door of her room. Everyone stood up. I watched her come forward: she was not pretty, but she bore herself like someone making a stage entrance. I imagined the moment when she had put her beautiful hand on the door handle, prepared to open it, mustered up her public presence, consolidated it, breathed deeply, and pushed open the door to make her entry—the entry of a leader.
She passed impassively among the women, then stopped in front of me. “Can you orchestrate
Lustspiel?
The officers are very fond of Suppe’s overtures. Some time ago they gave me the piano part. See what you can do. It would make a good start for you.”
“Certainly, madame.”
Enchanted, Alma smiled at me. At the table, the copyists observed me cautiously: if I was all I’d made myself out to be, I represented a guarantee of life for the orchestra. So it was not just my writing crew who had their eyes on me, but all the girls; even the thickest Pole had grasped my importance. It was up to me to show them what I could do. I asked Alma if I could have some paper.
“There’s some on the table.”
“I mean lined paper, manuscript
Poor girl, her need to eat was so violently animal it frightened me.
“Of course, take it!”
That earned me the warm, grateful look of a spoiled cocker spaniel.
Gripping her steaming mug in both hands, Florette growled: “It gets more disgusting every day—and what do they make this bread with? Baked bones, to look at it! It’s just incredible.”
What seemed incredible to me was to hear that phrase here of all places, but no one reacted. Flora smiled vaguely; perhaps she didn’t even grasp the allusion. There was something utterly bovine about her that irritated me. Freckled Jenny tapped her piece of bread on the wooden table and joked: “Anyhow, no need for a hammer to resole your shoes. They mixed up the tradesmen: it’s not Fritz the baker who delivered the bread, but the ironmonger, Fritz the do-it-yourself man.”
I capped it. “You’re right, it’s even hard enough to smash Hitler’s head in.”
Enormous laughter, out of all proportion to the sally. Only Germans and Poles looked disapproving; as they didn’t understand, they always thought they were the butt of our jokes.
“That’s some idea!” Anny roared. “To kill Hitler with his own bread! It would be poetic justice, all right!”
There was a final chortle, then, one by one, we left the room.
Arbeit, Arbeit!
The players tuned their instruments. Seated at the copyists’ table, I took stock of my assistants. It wasn’t a brilliant array—they were the rejects: Zocha, the enormous creature who had come to fetch me in the first place, a hefty country girl who was such an appalling violinist that Tchaikowska, her protector, had speedily relegated her to the copyists’ table when Alma arrived. Danka, something of an athlete and probably the most dangerous because her hard expression showed intelligence; when she wasn’t copying, she played the cymbals literally fit to deafen you, feeling no doubt that the violence of her clashing alone would stir the work detachments into action, that by her zeal she was satisfying the SS. Between these two assertive monsters was Marisha, aged twenty, so pale and self-effacing as to be virtually invisible; even her stupidity was of the washed-out variety. At the other end—here, too, Aryan oil and Jewish water weren’t mixed—Hilde bent her obstinate, freshly shaven head over her paper. Intelligent, tyrannical, she immediately struck me as the führer of the German Jews of our block.
Pointing out my copyists to me, Alma had reminded me that she was the one in charge of them. What power could I wield over those Aryan Poles or over Hilde, who felt superior because she was German? I was a tamer without a whip, naked among vicious beasts. A charming prospect!
Alma appeared at the door of her room. Everyone stood up. I watched her come forward: she was not pretty, but she bore herself like someone making a stage entrance. I imagined the moment when she had put her beautiful hand on the door handle, prepared to open it, mustered up her public presence, consolidated it, breathed deeply, and pushed open the door to make her entry—the entry of a leader.
She passed impassively among the women, then stopped in front of me. “Can you orchestrate
Lustspiel?
The officers are very fond of Suppe’s overtures. Some time ago they gave me the piano part. See what you can do. It would make a good start for you.”
“Certainly, madame.”
Enchanted, Alma smiled at me. At the table, the copyists observed me cautiously: if I was all I’d made myself out to be, I represented a guarantee of life for the orchestra. So it was not just my writing crew who had their eyes on me, but all the girls; even the thickest Pole had grasped my importance. It was up to me to show them what I could do. I asked Alma if I could have some paper.
“There’s some on the table.”
“I mean lined paper, manuscript
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