Mila 18 - Leon Uris [169]
Chris pulled himself to his feet. “I’ve heard this talk, but I don’t believe it. Germany is a civilized country. The Germans aren’t capable of doing what you claim—it’s a lie.”
“I’ve just come from inside Majdanek. If you care to interview your friend Baron von Epp, I’ll gladly supply you with some very leading questions.”
Chris sank back into the chair again in a stupor. Andrei lay a typewritten book of a hundred pages before him. Chris glanced at it out of the corner of his eye but pulled his hand back. “I’m not your man,” he whispered.
“Chris, you and I have spent too many hours together putting this lousy world under our microscopes. I know how you’ve been pulled apart these last two years, but I’ve always known with all my soul that in the crucible you are unable to walk away from the cries of the anguished without destroying yourself as a human being.”
“I told you, no! Why the hell did you ask me here?”
“Chris! Chris! Chris! You and I believe in the final nobility of man! You can’t turn your back on us!”
Chris’s fist drummed against the table with a monotonous thudding repetition. “I’ve cried for justice before, Andrei! I cried rape and murder in Spain and it fell on deaf ears.”
“My God, Chris! Men have always destroyed each other. They always will. You can’t pull out because you’ve been hurt once.”
“Do you really believe that goddamned world out there is going to be moved by this report? It’s you who is the fool, not me. No one’s going to care about murdered Jews or starving Indians or floods in Holland or earthquakes in Japan so long as their stinking bellies are full! Your goddamned conscience of man is a myth, Andrei.”
Andrei hovered over Chris. He shook Chris’s shoulders, but the man would not unbend. Andrei slowly sank to his knees. “Chris, I beg you on my knees to help us.”
Gabriela jerked angrily at Andrei. “Get off your knees!” she commanded. “Get off your knees! You will never do this again before any man!”
Chris turned his sweaty face up to her enraged expression. He tried through bleary eyes to beg her to stop.
“You sanctimonious son of a bitch,” Gabriela quivered. “You sit up there on your throne and watch all us little ants scramble in fright to survive and you make your terse comments and your snide observations. I present to you, Christopher de Monti—champion of the press! Oh God, no. Don’t dirty your precious hands with our blood.”
“All I ever wanted is for Deborah to live—that’s all—that’s all I’ve ever wanted. I know she’ll never see me again, but I want her to live—that’s all I’ve ever wanted.”
“Your sister is a very fortunate woman, Andrei. In a single lifetime she has had two upstanding men like Paul Bronski and Christopher de Monti who would sell their souls for her.”
Andrei was limp with weakness and humiliation. “My sister is a woman,” he whispered. “She will take her life and the life of her children before she allows you to save her at the expense of a betrayal to the Nazis.”
“That’s enough, Andrei,” Gabriela said. “Look at him. He is completely degenerated.”
Andrei gave up. He walked to the door. “You were right, Gabriela. We should not have asked him. I’d like to spit on you, Chris, but I must save my strength.”
Andrei left the room.
“You’re not worthy of his spit,” Gabriela said, and followed.
Chris slumped over the table, weeping, choking on his own saliva and tears. His hand fell on the report. He pulled his head up. He gained control of himself and turned the first page.
COMBINED JEWISH ORGANIZATIONS’ REPORT ON EXTERMINATION CENTERS IN OPERATION WITHIN THE GENERAL GOVERNMENT AREA OF POLAND, JULY 1942
We are able to authenticate firmly the existence of four centers in the General Government Area created for the sole purpose of conducting mass exterminations. In addition, two combination concentration-extermination camps are in existence. There are five hundred labor camps in Poland, of which a hundred and forty are reserved