I turned our rented Mercedes down Kunibertistraße in Recklinghausen and scanned the dimly lit buildings for numbers. There was no moon, and no traffic. The deserted one-way street had barely enough room to pass a parked car. It ran through the historic center of the city, between buildings that were hundreds of years old. My teenage children were growing restless when something caught my eye. A large group of people huddled directly ahead of us in the darkness fifty yards away. I slowed almost to a stop and looked in my rear-view mirror. Others were behind us. They walked up the street toward our car. People swarmed around our car heading toward the others. They wore black hoods, some in long cloaks, like monks; they passed us on both sides, blocking any escape.
Suddenly those in front of us were illuminated by fire. Torches. There were fifty, then a hundred, then two hundred or more carrying lit torches. We were the only car on the street. I put the Mercedes in reverse, waiting for a chance to slowly back out of whatever was developing. Michelle put her hand on my arm. “Look.”
They started a slow ominous march. Their faces had caught her attention. They were pure white. Not skin white, mask white. White masks covered their faces with a small mouth forming not quite an “o” but not truly open. A look of menacing anonymity.
They marched straight toward us with a long sign held by those in front. The lettering looked like Old English but was German. On they came. They spread across the street. Their torches threw over-sized shadows on the ancient buildings.
They drew even with our car. My son leaned forward in the back seat to take a picture with his new digital camera I’d bought him for the trip. It was set to eliminate redeye, which resulted in a multi-flash picture of the front of the march.
They stopped. One pointed at me. I hesitated. I put the car in park. They came at us in complete silence. One ran directly at our car. I moved my hand to the door to make sure they were locked. He ran up to our car with his torch and put his gloved hand on the back window where Christopher was sitting.
“Dad,” Chris said in a shaky voice.
“Don’t look at him.”
The man put his masked face a few inches from Chris’s window and looked at all of us. He moved his hissing torch to the window and touched it against the glass. It blackened a spot on the glass. Two others moved toward our car.
He dragged the burning end of his torch to my window and waited for me to look at him. I wouldn’t. He tapped the burning torch against my window, slowly. It was louder than I expected. I kept my hands on the steering wheel.
He suddenly struck the butt of his torch loudly on my window. I still wouldn’t look at him, which angered him. He struck the window harder and harder with his torch, which threw sparks over the car. The window shattered. I covered my face with my arms as glass pieces covered my head. He punched the rest of the window in with his gloved fist and said something in a whisper in German. I didn’t understand what he wanted, and then he turned his fingers, like starting a car. I took the keys out of the ignition and handed them to him.
“Kyle, no!” Michelle protested.
“We have no choice,” I said.
He pressed the button on the remote to unlock the car. I jumped as the locks flew up on the doors, and he grabbed Chris’s door and threw it open. “No way,” I said, as I opened my door to climb out. He slammed my door against me and held it closed. Another man ran over and held my door shut. Two others on the sidewalk held the doors of my wife and daughter.
The first man opened Chris’s door again, leaned in and stuck out his hand. “Camera,” he said in English.
“Dad?”
“Give it to him!” Michelle responded.
I turned to see what was happening. He stared at Chris with the torch almost in the car. Emily, sitting on the other side of Chris, was crying. She slumped down in her seat.
Chris gave his camera to the man who took it and dropped it onto the pavement. He then stomped on it with his boot. He slammed Chris’s door closed, pressed the door lock button on the keys, then flung the keys on top of the building next to our car. He turned and joined the march. As he turned away, I saw the Nazi swastika armband over the sleeve of his long black cloak.