Maria did not know then that she would not be dead a long time. In 1945, when the war ended, she would be ten. Inexplicably, her visits to Uncle Felix stopped before then.
But until that time, each week on Saturday afternoons, Maria was taken to his office, where Uncle Felix would give her “vitamins.” Often before the visits, Maria lay on her cot in the family room, stiffly, passively, refusing to respond to her mother’s pleas. “Maria, put on your coat. It is time to leave now.” Then, more forcefully: “Come, Maria, you must.” Maria tried hard to make herself even more dead; with a little effort, she could almost tune out her mother’s existence.
But inevitably, she didn’t know how, these refusals would end. Larger than death, her young and beautiful mother would win. For her mother was helpless and angry. And it was somehow Maria’s fault.
Years later, Maria was to read about Gandhi and the principle of passive resistance. She had almost invented it, she felt. With just a little more time, she might have perfected it. She read of swamis lying on beds of nails and not feeling anything. She read of people staring at the sun. Maria practiced all this, or the equivalent.
At night, she stared into the darkness of the room and pretended not to hear little Philip when he cried. She found she could tune out the grown-ups when they talked to her. Later, in school, she practiced not moving at all, although sometimes she would blink when her name was called.
Maria practiced being clean. She practiced being good. She was a top student. She practiced being invisible. “How good she is,” the adults marveled. “Maria is always so polite.” Maria liked this; it gave her more time to be herself beneath the facade. But there was no self. Maria practiced and practiced being dead. It would become a useful skill.
Maria felt most herself, that is to say, most dead, when lying on Uncle Felix’s examining table, her hand forcibly pressed to Uncle Felix’s “broken leg.” She let herself float out of her body, up near the walls among the photographs of the angel children. Had they, too, been in this room? She wondered, regarding their grave little faces. They all seemed so clean, so purified. Maria knew that she would join them someday; Uncle Felix was making her ready for that other life. She longed to wear white.
Somewhere in the room, far away, Maria listened to the sounds of water running. Felix washed his hands. Maria lay before him, naked, meek, and sacrificial. She thought of heaven.
Maria encountered another little girl waiting in the entry, a child also accompanied by a nervous, fussing mother. Maria did not want to think about this too much. The two girls would, in passing, lower their eyes in shame and confusion, avoiding each other’s too-careful scrutiny. Did they share the same experience with Uncle Felix? Did the other girl need “vitamins” also? Maria wondered, turning her head in sudden, sharp, unbearable pain.
After her sessions with Uncle Felix, Maria sat outside the door on the little sofa and waited for her mother. Did her mother need “vitamins,” too? Maria heard, through the door, her mother’s hypocritical laugh, and a growl that seemed to come from Uncle Felix. She buried her head in Schatzie’s neck. Sometimes, as the door closed, she saw, in her mind’s eye, her mother’s beautiful slip, her blouse, flung over the top edge of the yellow Chinese screen.
When she was older, her mother stopped going with her to Uncle Felix’s. But this was after Maria’s father, David, had returned to the family. “You’re old enough to go there by yourself,” Maria’s mother said.
Maria was too thin, with deep bluish circles under her eyes, and an anxious expression, which she tried to tame into impassive calmness. She didn’t protest too much, had long since given up protesting. The dead feel nothing, after all, so what did it matter? Meekly, she went.
Felix’s room was always warm, and with a certain voluptuous dread, Maria partook of his rituals. His “broken leg,” her “badness,” all these she accepted. After Felix was finished, he stroked her forehead, her hair. She was his “good girl” then. She felt loved and soothed. Maria imagined that at those times she heard the angels singing. Yet, immediately after, Felix dismissed her with a brusque dislike. She could see she wasn’t good enough yet; and each time, between the visits, Maria was a “bad girl” again.
Maria wanted to stop eating. She wanted to stop going to the bathroom. She ate less and less, and although the family did not have much food, she gave half her share to little Philip. Maria’s mother, noticing this, began to scold the girl. “Can’t you see how hard I work for our food? Be grateful, you ungrateful child!” Maria held the tears back from her eyes and stared at her mother while at the same time trying to make her vanish.
“You must eat.” Irritated, Ilse steeled herself angrily for this new development in their lives. “The child does not eat.” Maria’s mother expostulated to Felix during one of their visits the following month. With frustration, she regarded her wan girl.
Felix bent down and scowled at her. “What is this, you bad girl?” His brows beetled. “Now you worry your poor mother? She has enough already to worry about. You must eat, my child! Otherwise,” he hissed, “you will go to the hospital. And do you know what they will do to you there?” Maria shrank back. She did not want to know. “Do you know what they do to little girls there, hmm? They make them into liverwurst!” he exclaimed, his voice a dramatic whisper.
Maria tried to cover her ears. “Yes,” he insisted. “Liverwurst! Do you want that?” He stepped back a pace. “So…,” he said in a low, threatening voice, “I want to hear no more of this nonsense, hmm?” He flipped a sugar cube to Schatzie. “If you do not eat, you will come to me every day.” His voice rose to a shriek. “And do you know what I will do to you?” Maria tried to shut him out, but his hot breath was close to her face and his voice at full volume. “Uncle Felix will beat you, bad girl! Ja, every day! You will come to Uncle Felix every day and he will beat you.”
Felix looked up at Maria’s mother for emphasis. Then his tone changed again. He fixed Maria’s mother with his black hypnotic eyes. “Authority, my dear madame. What this child needs is some authority! You are much too lax.” Maria’s mother unloosed the silken scarf from her neck. She looked down at Maria. Maria could see in her mother’s eyes fear and determination, as well as the sense of being utterly alone. Felix seized both Maria’s and her mother’s hands in his own. “Now,” he said, “this is better. We will be a good girl now, yes, and eat for Mutti?” He stroked Maria’s hair. “And Mutti will be happy.” Maria nodded. “And you will make your old Uncle Felix happy, heh? He does not really want to beat you.”
Maria nodded and shrank back. He took this for assent. Felix pressed her mother’s hand. “You see, dear lady, all that is needed is authority. A man’s authority.” He looked significantly at Maria’s mother. Maria despised them both, but she did not show it.
“Mutti will tell me if you do not eat,” Felix warned Maria. He took her into his office then. His hands spent a long time with her, but they were not so nice. “Remember, you promised.” He was angry with her, impatient as he pressed her against his lumpy leg. He was eager to be done with her that day. But with her mother, he took a long time. Maria sat on the couch outside, waiting, and pondering her sins. Her stomach gurgled. She felt suddenly ravenous with hunger.