A Child Al Confino: The True Story of a Jewish Boy and His Mother in Mussolini's Italy (9 page)

Bertl did so two days later, and the three of us shared the same room: I slept in a cot against the wall. Mother and Bertl doubled up in the large bed. I had hoped the newfound friend would give my mother less time to watch over me. Instead, now I found myself with two mothers — worse, two typical Jewish mothers. This was more than any child needed to add happy confusion to his life.

Plump and barely a hairline taller than
Mutti
, Bertl resembled her in many ways. However, Bertl was not as pretty; while my mother had a petite and straight nose, Bertl's was hooked. Bertl did have a good sense of humor and a sharp mind, and she shared with my mother a strength of character that made both women survivors. The friends' similarities and compatibility made our lives quite harmonious in spite of the cramped quarters. Only their smoking I found intolerable. For hours, the two would sit in their robes in that small room, chatting and puffing on those thin, white paper tubes, creating enough smoke to force me to run out.

“Where are you going?”

“
Mutti
, I'm getting nauseous from the smell.”

“Oh, my poor
Hasele?
Come here. Give me a kiss, then you can go.”

“I want a kiss, too,” announced Bertl.

Ugh! That stench of tobacco on their breaths.

“You don't have to hold your nose,” said
Mutti
, as she gave me a slight, playful swat on my behind.

Bertl brought humor back into our lives.
Mutti
had not laughed as hard and as often since we had left Vienna. Laughter proved good medicine for her, often restoring the cheerful mood I so well remembered. Because Bertl was also an excellent cook, my two mothers took turns preparing Viennese specialties.

“Who is cooking today?” I asked.

“Who do you want to cook?” my mother replied.

“I don't care, you both make good
Wiener Schnitzel.”

Bertl gave this very lucky boy the same warmth and motherly affection my
Mutti
did. On occasion Bertl even took my side by getting my mother to change her mind about one thing or another, like the day I asked for some pocket money.

“You don't need money,” my mother said.

“I'll give him some money,” said Bertl. “The poor child. Erich, get me my purse.”

“You're trouble, Bertie. If I tell him something, please don't interfere. Stop spoiling my child.”

“You mean our child.”

Mother seemed obsessed with my schooling. Within days of our arrival in Nice, she enrolled me in public school. Again I was forced, like other children, to rise early and do homework.

“I want you to learn to speak French,”
Mutti
said.

French? Why did I have to go to school? This made absolutely no sense to me. What was wrong with the way I was living? But I had learned that I rarely came out ahead when I argued with Mother.

My having acquired a good command of Italian made French easier to learn. Only a few weeks after setting foot on French soil, I began to converse in this beautiful language.

Eric at age eight with dog in Nice, France, 1939.

As on previous occasions and, true to my character, however, I was unable to control my impulses in class. Caught for the third time talking to the boy next to me, I explained to the teacher that I was just practicing my new language. The teacher was not in the least impressed by my reasonable explanation. Instead he ordered me to hold out my hand, which he struck with a wooden rod.

Mother saw my swollen fingers. “What is this?” she asked.

On my way home I had thought up a story but in the end came to the conclusion that the truth was the best policy. I did not want to risk the even more severe punishment my mother would mete out had she caught me lying.

“I don't know what I'm going to do with you. Will you ever behave?” Mother's voice was shrill.

I stood silent. What could I possibly say? It was difficult for me to follow rules. Not to speak during class was absolute torture.

“Stay home for two days, then I'll decide what to do with you.”

Mutti
refused to regress and allow someone else to use the ruler on her son. So she sent a letter to the school telling them her son would not be coming back. After only a few weeks, my scholastic days were cut short. My
Mutti
could be so wonderful at times!

For the next three months I enjoyed the freedom to do as I pleased. The weather in Nice invited people to sun themselves beginning in early spring and bare-breasted young women lying on the pebble beach started to attract my attention. My instincts to look at beautiful female curves gave me a naughty feeling.

“You're getting too tanned,”
Mutti
warned. “You can't stay out all day in the sun. It's not healthy for you. Why not spend more time with us?”

“You and Bertl only talk and smoke. I get so bored.”

Bertl had entered the room and overheard part of the conversation. “Well, tonight I'll take you out to a fine restaurant.”

Since leaving Milan, my mother and I had been to only cheap neighborhood eating places. That night we did dine out and what a treat it turned out to be. Soon after we ordered our food, but without anyone asking for it, the waiter wheeled over a small cart with a large variety of hors d'oeuvres. I could not believe what was on that cart: Russian salad, red beets, small beans, cucumbers, smoked fish, hard-boiled eggs, olives, and more fish.

“Bertl, how many things do you think there are?” I asked.

“Go ahead, count them.”

I did and counted forty. Wow!

“You can eat as much as you want,” she said.

“Are you sure?” my mother asked.

“Oh yes. It's all included in the price of the meal.”

I must have tried a bit from every dish when Mother asked, “Will you be able to eat dinner?”

“Oh, sure!” I said. But when the main course, a veal cutlet, was served, I could eat less than half. But I did force down my chocolate dessert.

The Promenade des Anglais, adorned by a long line of palm trees and, beautified with colorful flowers, ran alongside the beaches for the full length of the city. From here, built on pylons and jetting out into the water, was the municipal casino. Nice's major gambling center also had a large theater where a variety of vaudeville shows were performed. Free passes to these shows were easily available from retail stores and professional offices. A doctor's office, where these passes lay on the reception room table, became my source.

The casino was five blocks from our house. The first time I used one of the passes, I ran all the way home after the show. I had barely opened the door when I blurted, “
Mutti
! Guess what I did today?”

“Calm down,
Schatzele,
”
Mutti
said from our room. “Look how red you are. Sit. Do you want some water?”

I was breathless. “No, just guess what I did.”

“You got married.”

“No, seriously.”

“I don't know. Tell me.”

“I went to the casino and saw the greatest show in the world.”

“That's nice. How did you get in?”

“A friend told me about this office where they have free passes. They wouldn't let me into the rooms where they gamble but only into the theater. They had a magician, a comic, some acrobats and lots of dancers.”

“What else did they have?”
Mutti
asked. “It's written all over your face.”

I had a real problem getting it out. I had never seen so many bare-breasted women. “The dancers wore nothing on top.”

“Why are you blushing,
Hasele
? I'm the only one here.”

From that day on, instead of walking the promenade or roasting my skin at the beach, I spent many afternoons at a vaudeville show.

Since coming to Nice, I had envied people sitting at the open-air cafés. Oh, how I wanted to do that! One morning I asked
Mutti
to give me the half franc needed for a continental breakfast. “It would be such a treat,” I said.

In spite of money being in short supply, she handed me the coin. “Go, have breakfast out.”

Fresh rolls, a croissant, butter, jams, coffee, and a small pitcher of hot milk. What a breakfast! Relaxing in the fresh air under an immense open umbrella and, having an elegant server wait on me, made me feel so grown up. With great care, I sliced the roll and spread butter and jam on each side, restored the two halves and, with a slight squeeze, sunk my teeth in it. Oh, how
merveilleux!
I devoured both rolls, the croissant, with the rest of the butter, jam, and the full pot of French coffee. Then, with a touch of flair, I asked for
l'addition
and handed the man the fifty
centimes
.

The beach was a short walk from the café. My shorts and shirt removed, I enjoyed the balmy air in the bikini trunks I wore underneath. Only the sandals stayed on my feet, for I had not yet adapted to walking on the stony beach.

Rarely did I find other children on the beach. The tourist season had not started and school was still in session. For almost two months, until the end of June, I spent those magnificent spring days surrounded by hundreds of strangers but feeling so alone.

At one o'clock, I often went to the casino for a show I had seen before. I seldom ate lunch on those days, satiating my hunger with the few candies the artists threw from the stage at the end of each performance. Although there was always a great lunch waiting for me, I rarely was willing to give up my liberty in exchange for food.

On those few days when the casino featured totally nude dancers, they refused me admission, so I would walk up the hill overlooking the port. The harbor, narrow and short, was large enough to hold only a few small craft. There I saw three British submarines, my first encounter with military hardware.

During the turmoil of the previous fourteen months, I had not been to a synagogue once. Although we were able to bring very few personal items when we escaped from Vienna, my mother had taken along the old family prayer book. Throughout our nomadic days, she handled that book with great care.

Both my parents had been raised in Orthodox families where the dietary kosher laws had been strictly observed. In Vienna, my
Omama
came to visit every week but seldom on a Friday or Saturday, for she would not travel on the Sabbath. She always visited us after supper and never shared a meal with us. “Our home is not kosher enough for
Omama
,”
Mutti
explained. Nor did my grandfather in Poland allow anyone to turn the lights on or off on the holy day. Lights were always turned on before sundown Friday and left burning until past sundown on Saturday.

My own religious upbringing had been less strict, although, beginning when I was only five, I had to put up with a tutor who came weekly to give me religious instruction. Like most Jewish families who had come from eastern Europe to settle in Vienna, my parents chose a more secular lifestyle. Yet, throughout our roaming, my mother rarely failed to light the Sabbath candles, say her prayers for the High Holidays, or fast on the Day of Atonement. In later years, unable to find out the exact date for Rosh Hashanah,
Mutti
would make up her own.

“How can you just pick a date? Yom Kippur is designated by God,” I said.

“God will forgive me,” she replied.

On our first Friday night in Nice, Mother had just lit the customary Sabbath candles when Monique appeared in the doorway. Three times ritually, my mother swept her hands over the tiny flames, then covered her eyes.

The woman was horrified, her face ashen. “What are you doing?” she asked, her voice growing louder with each word. “Are you some kind of witch? Are you bringing the evil spirits into my house?”

Mother approached the hysterical woman and tried to place an arm around her shoulder. “
Ma chère …
”

Monique rotated herself away. “No, no. Don't you touch me!” she shrieked.

In a conciliatory tone, struggling with her poor French,
Mutti
reassured the frightened woman she had nothing to fear. It was all part of our religion. If Mother had not been as convincing, surely we could have found ourselves out in the street without a place to sleep for the night.

I assumed that my mother, mindful of her experience in the Gigli home, did not want to discuss our Jewishness with Monique, nor did the woman ever ask about our religion.

When Bertl came to stay with us,
Mutti
told her about the incident. Bertl thought it hilarious and wanted to perform some invented ceremony just to inflame the landlady.
Mutti
couldn't control her own laughter.

“You're crazy,” she said.

“Let's have some fun,” Bertl suggested.

“Sure and then find ourselves on the street with a nine-year-old.”

The subtropical weather in Nice was a glorious experience for a kid who grew up in Vienna, with its gray winters of snow, rain, and cold weather. Sunny day followed sunny day with hardly a rainy one in between. Even a day with a dark cloud in the sky was a rarity. In Nice, flowers were everywhere, from the well-maintained public gardens to the many street vendors: azaleas, gardenias, geraniums, gladiolas, carnations, bougainvilleas, but mostly roses of every conceivable color even dark blue.