To want death but not the pain of dying is a bad sign. Except for that, death can be faced.
—KAFKA BRIEFE AS MILENA
One of the most dreaded institutions in Ravensbruck was the “labor mobilization.” Every day labor gangs were formed to work in munitions or other war-connected factories or in the construction of airfields. Every prisoner hoped to stay in the main camp and to avoid being shipped to the annexes, in most of which the food was much worse.
After my recovery, for fear of being shipped out, I looked around for a “good” outside job in the main camp. Some Polish prisoners who knew me offered me a job in the logging gang, and I accepted gladly. The prisoner in charge, Mother Liberak, as the Poles called her, was an angel, and from time to time each member of the crew was given a day off. A week later my turn came. It was a sunny day in the late fall. I couldn’t bear to stay shut up in the barracks and Milena had errands in various parts of the camp, so I joined her. This was risky, but as Milena was wearing the yellow armband of an infirmary worker, the camp police didn’t bother us.
We walked about, deep in conversation. On one side, we could see the last yellow leaves at the top of a willow tree on the far side of the wall, on the other, there were dark pine trees. We talked about the forests and cities we planned to see together someday and about the loved ones who were waiting for us. On the outside, life was going on; perhaps our children, who would soon be young girls, had forgotten us. Fear of the censorship had reduced the few letters we received from outside into impersonal stereotypes. “I really know nothing about Honza,” said Milena sadly. “If only she would tell me the color of her dress or whether she’s started to wear silk stockings, or what she does on some particular day. If she’d only stop telling me that she goes to school and likes to play the piano.” Milena worried about the child, she reproached herself for having involved Honza in her own private and political life so young. And now this independent, precocious child was having to contend with her grandfather, who must be treating her as capriciously and tyrannically as he had treated her mother. In his letters he referred to his granddaughter as pohanka, the little pagan, and Milena gathered from certain cautious hints that Honza had run away from him and had been getting into trouble with various sets of foster parents. What Milena did not know was how very much the child’s grandfather admired her courage and strength of character, because not even the Gestapo had succeeded in making her talk.
Milena showed me her father’s latest letter, which expressed only worry and real affection. In a mellow mood that day, she said, “My father’s love for his own flesh and blood had a strange way of expressing itself, but it can’t be helped. He’s a tyrant and that’s that.” Then she spoke of his good qualities, how splendidly he had behaved when the Germans marched into Prague. And she also had pleasant childhood memories connected with him. He was an enthusiastic skier; he had taught her to ski at a time when such activities were unusual for women and he had taken her on marvelous skiing trips. With a group of his students and often with his old friend Matus, he had led her through the wintry beauty of the Bohemian forest. “To look at me now,” she said, “you wouldn’t believe that I was once one of the best woman skiers in the country. I even tried to keep it up with my stiff knee.”
As we were turning back at the end of the camp street, we were horrified to catch sight of Dittman, head of the labor mobilization service. Before he had even reached us he started bellowing, “What are you doing here during working hours?” He remembered me from Langefeld’s office and knew about all my “crimes.” “Why haven’t you reported for labor mobilization?” he shouted at me. His face, which owed its special character to a boil on one cheek, went purple with rage. “I’m sick,” I said. “I’ve been assigned to inside duty.” That was the only he that occurred to me. Luckily, he left Milena alone because of her yellow armband. “You haven’t been in the Bunker for quite a while, have you? Report to the labor mobilization office this minute or the fur will fly.” His top boots creaked as he turned to go.
When I got there, Dittman called me into his private office and belabored me with dire threats. In the end he ordered me to report to the tailor shop for punitive work on the assembly line. “Report to Oberscharführer Graf. I’ll phone him to expect you. Get going!”
On August 10, 1943, Milena’s Czech friends showed their affection for her. Suspecting that this would be her last birthday, they decided to give her a real party. In the orderly room of a barracks with a Czech Blockälteste, the table was covered with presents. All those who loved Milena were present: Anicka Kva-pilovä, Tomy Kleinerovä, Nina the dancer, Milena Fischerovä, the writer, Hana Feierabendovä, Mana Opocenskä, Manja Sve-dikovä, Bertel Schindlerovä, and others whose names I have forgotten. Someone went to get the birthday child and she was led to the table. The gifts consisted of handkerchiefs embroidered with a prisoner’s number, tiny cloth hearts marked with the name “Milena,” figurines carved from toothbrush handles, flowers that had been smuggled into camp.
Milena, who was very ill by then and too weak to keep up all her friendships, was moved to tears: “What a surprise!” she said. “And I thought you’d all forgotten me and weren’t friends with me anymore. Forgive me for not coming to see you more often. But from now on I’ll be better.” Surrounded by her Czech friends, Milena was all joy and gratitude. I, the “little Prussian,” stood a little to one side, watching the others laugh, enjoying the unusual atmosphere. I felt transported to Prague, to Milena’s natural surroundings. What Milena wanted most in the world was to have friends. She once wrote: “If you have two or three people, but what am I saying, if you have just one person with whom you can be weak, miserable, and contrite, and who won’t hurt you for it, then you are rich. You can expect indulgence only of one who loves you, never from others and, above all, never from yourself.”