Authors: Leon Uris
They passed into Lincoln’s Inn through the New Gateway and just beyond the Great Hall the magnificent gardens and walkways unfolded.
Much of Lincoln’s Inn was leased to solicitors. Solicitors had offices. Barristers had chambers. The law offices of Alexander, Bernstein, and Friedman occupied the basement, ground level, and first floor of 8 Park Square. A top-hatted assistant porter waved Lady Wydman’s Bentley into a reserved parking space and Abe followed her into a maze of cubbyholes, creaking floors, endless stacks of papers, walls of books, hidden nooks and stairs that made up the quaint offices of Alexander, Bernstein, and Friedman, Commissioners of Oaths.
Alexander’s secretary, a miniskirted young lady named Sheila Lamb, who had taken a lifelong ribbing for that name, entered the tiny waiting room inundated with back copies of
Punch.
“Follow me, please,” she said.
Jacob Alexander arose from behind his desk, a tall slender man with bushy gray hair who could have been someone’s conception of a Biblical prophet. He greeted Cady warmly and spoke in the deep tones of a trained rabbi.
Sheila Lamb closed the door behind her as she left.
“We have spoken among ourselves at great length,” Alexander said. “It would be unthinkable to apologize to Adam Kelno in open court. It could be taken in the same context as apologizing to the Nazis for our outrage over the extermination camps.”
“I’m well aware of the issues,” Abe said, “also our chances.” He went on to recite Lewin’s disastrous predictions and that Shawcross was probably out of it.
“Unfortunately, Mr. Cady, you are an international symbol to Jew and non-Jew alike. The man who wrote
The Holocaust
must assume responsibilities he cannot divest himself of.”
“What kind of support am I going to get?”
Alexander shrugged. “Maybe yes, maybe no.”
“I still can’t foot the bill.”
“Neither can we,” Alexander said. “But once we engage the action, I believe you’ll find support.”
“And if a decision goes against us?”
“There’s always bankruptcy.”
“I hear that word too often. I think you’re asking too much. I am not positive in my own mind that Kelno is guilty.”
“And if I convinced you Kelno is guilty.”
Abe was shaken. Through it all he had hoped for a loophole to get out with some sense of honor. But, if he were shown cold evidence there was hardly a way he could back off. Lady Wydman and Alexander looked at him and both of them searched. Is this the man who wrote
The Holocaust
? Was his courage merely paper courage?
“I guess, ” Abe said, “anybody can be a hero as long as it doesn’t cost him anything. I’d better have a look at what you’ve got.”
Alexander pressed the buzzer and Sheila Lamb responded. “Mr. Cady and I will be flying to Paris. Put us on a flight around six o’clock and hook two singles at the Meurice. Call the I.F.J.O. representative in Paris, Mr. Edelman, and give him our arrival time and get him to contact Pieter Van Damm and tell him we will be in tonight.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Pieter Van Damm, Abe whispered.
“That’s right,” Alexander answered, “Pieter Van Damm.”
7
P
IETER
V
AN
D
AMM GREETED
them warmly in the foyer of his sumptuous apartment on Boulevard Maurice Barres. Along with Cady and Alexander there was Samuel Edelman, French representative of the I.F.J.O.
“I’m honored,” Abe said, grasping the hand of the world-famed violinist.
“The honor is mine,” Van Damm answered.
The maid took their coats and hats. “My wife and children are in the country. Come, come.”
An enormous study held a gallery of presidents and kings photographed with the man whom many believed to be the world’s greatest violinist. A French walnut antique Pleyel grand piano was carelessly stacked with sheets of music near his practice stand. Van Damm showed off a pair of Amati Violins with the childish pride of one who obviously enjoyed his renown.
They grouped about on a sofa and chairs in an alcove looking down to the Bois de Boulogne, settling in with cognac and whisky.
“L’Chiam,” Van Damm said.
“L’Chiam,” they responded.
Van Damm set his drink down. “I suppose I should start from the beginning. I was twenty-four when the war broke out, married, with a child and a first violinist with the Hague Symphony. My name at that time was Menno Donker. You know the story of how we were forced into hiding. Roundups began by the Germans in the summer of 1942 and then, the large scale deportations in the winter and spring of 1943.”
Van Damm halted a moment, pained with memory. “I was deported in the winter of 1942 in an unheated cattle car. My child froze to death on the way and my wife was taken for gassing at the selection shed when we arrived at Jadwiga.”
Abe bit his lip and clenched his jaw to hold back tears. No matter how many times he heard the story it tore at his soul.
“You told it all so well for all of us in your novel,” Van Damm continued. “I was sent to work in the medical compound. Adam Kelno was the chief of the prisoner/doctors, and I was assigned more or less as a clerk/orderly. I kept records, ordered medicine, scrubbed floors, whatever.”
“So you had a day to day relationship of sorts with Kelno?”
“Yes. In the summer of 1943 I was approached by a Czech prisoner by the name of Egon Sobotnik. He was a member of the underground and solicited my help in forging death certificates, smuggling medicine, and things of that nature. I agreed, of course. Sobotnik’s official job was to keep the surgical records so I learned of the experiments being carried on in Barrack V. Between us we kept a diary on Barrack V and smuggled it out of the camp in bits and pieces.”
“Were you ever in Barrack V, yourself? “
“Only to be operated on. Kelno got wind of my activities and I was transferred to Barrack III, which held the raw material for the experiments. At first I was to look after six younger Dutch boys who had their testicles irradiated by prolonged exposure to X-ray. It was part of an experiment to sterilize all the Jews. You wrote about that. We were on the upper floor of the barrack and the women below. It seems they had X-rayed a number of young women also.”
“In the evening of November 10, 1943,” Van Damm’s voice shook, “fourteen of us were taken from Barrack III to Barrack V. Eight men, six women. I was the first to go. You see, Mr. Cady, I am a eunuch. Adam Kelno removed both of my testicles.”
Abe felt as though he were going to vomit. He stood up quickly and turned his back to the others. Van Damm stirred his cognac and gazed at its color and took a small sip.
“You were healthy when he did this?” Alexander asked.
“Yes.”
“Was Dr. Mark Tesslar in the operating roam?”
“As I said, I was the first one and Tesslar was not there then. I learned later that there was so much commotion they sent for him to keep the victims calm. Tesslar took care of the men afterwards. Without him I don’t think I would have lived. A woman doctor, a Maria Viskova, took care of the girls on the floor below. And also, there was a French woman doctor who came from time to time, mostly with the girls.”
“We are in contact with both of them,” Alexander said.
Van Damm told the rest of his story in monotone. After the liberation he made his way back to Holland to learn that all of his family had been exterminated.
He drifted to Paris sorely in need of medical attention, and was pulled together by a saintly doctor. At first he wanted to study for the rabbinate, but his mutilation and the results of it were so obvious it was not possible.
Menno Danker hovered close to insanity. He was made to take up the violin again as therapy. With the help of a constant and devoted physician he was able to receive shots and hormones to give him a semblance of masculinity; a little beard, a deeper voice. With the physician always in attendance he was able to play. The rare poignancy that marked his music was born from the pits of tragedy. In a short time, the public found his genius. It was a small miracle in itself that a eunuch could have such lust and vigor required of a great virtuoso.
After the war he met the daughter of a prominent Dutch Jewish family of Orthodox learning. They fell in love in a sort of a way that seemed lost in today’s world. It was a spiritual and religious union. For a long time he was able to conceal his secret and then came that awful moment when he had to tell her.
It made no difference. She wanted to take the vows with him, regardless. After a bitter struggle with his conscience he went to her parents and as religious Jews, they agreed and made a secret marriage contract knowing the union could never be consummated physically.
It is said that there is no more devoted or happier couple alive than the Van Damms. Twice they left on sabbaticals of a year’s duration and each time they returned with an adopted child. Insofar as the world and the children themselves knew, the Van Damms were their natural parents.
Alexander and Edelman wept openly as Pieter Van Damm finished his story. Abraham Cady, now returned to being the practiced journalist, sat granite-faced.
“And you changed your name to Van Damm when you began your concert career.”
“Yes. It was a family name.”
“What became of Sobotnik, the diary you smuggled out, the surgical records?”
“Disappeared. Egon Sobotnik was alive when Jadwiga was liberated, but he simply disappeared.”
“We will turn over heaven and earth to find him,” Alexander said.
“What you have just told us,” Abe said, “will bring another tragedy to yourself, your wife, and your children. It may bring great harm to your career.
“I think I understand the consequences.”
“And you are willing to say all of this in a courtroom.”
“I’m a Jew. I know my duty.”
“When Kelno did this to you, did he have any consideration for you at all?”
“He was brutal.”
Abraham Cady was not the kind of man to live protectively, yet he felt both doomed and ashamed of having wanted to pull out. The strain plus the sorrow swept him.
“Do you have any further questions?” Alexander asked.
“No,” Abe whispered, “no.”
8
I
MMEDIATELY UPON HIS RETURN
from Paris a meeting with Shawcross and the solicitors was arranged. It was a nightmare. Haggling went on for hours.
Even with the evidence of Van Damm, Lewin was reluctant to let Shawcross enter the case. Jacob Alexander argued, in return, that Shawcross had made a great deal of profit from
The Holocaust
and other Cady books and should bear apart of the burden, if only a fraction.
A dozen side conferences were called.
“You’ve whittled them down enough,” Shawcross said. “Abe is willing to take the full brunt of any judgment against us. I don’t think we can ask more.”
“He may sign a contract to that effect but suppose he decides not to honor it?”
“Come to your senses. Geoff Dodd’s resignation is sitting on your desk.”
They convened in the cluttered conference room. Shawcross rejected Sheila Lamb’s offer of tea. His unlit cigar hung limply as he avoided Abe’s searching stare.
“I’ve been advised to pull out,” Shawcross said.
“What, no lecture about integrity? You’re very good at giving those,” Abe said in rising anger.
Alexander grabbed Abe. “Excuse us for a moment, gentlemen,” he said, and moved out into the hallway where they had conferred a dozen times during the day. Abe sagged against the wall.
“Oh, Jesus,” he moaned.
Alexander’s firm hand was on his shoulder as they stood in silence for several moments. “You’ve done your best,” Alexander said. “I have been wearing two hats, the Jewish hat and the hat of a friend. I must speak to you now as a brother. We have no chance with Shawcross out.”
“I keep thinking about my trip to Jadwiga,” Abe said. “I saw the room where they were operated on. I saw the claw marks gouged out of concrete walls in the gas chamber in that last desperate second of life. Who in the hell has a choice? I keep thinking over and over it was Ben and Vanessa. I wake up and hear her screaming on the operating table. Where do I go from here, Alexander? A clay hero? My boy flies for Israel. What am I going to tell him? All over the world the kids are pointing a finger at us and demanding to know who stands for humanity. Well, at least I have more choice than Pieter Van Damm had. I will not apologize to Adam Kelno.”
Mr. Josephson, managing clerk of Alexander, Bernstein, and Friedman for nearly two decades, sat opposite his grim master.
“Cady is going to have a go at it alone,” Alexander said.
“Bit chancy,” the wise old figure answered.
“Yes, a bit. I’m thinking about our lead counsel Thomas Bannister. He stood for extradition against Kelno two decades ago.”
Josephson shook his head. “Tom Bannister is the best in England,” he agreed, “but who can put the bell around the cat’s neck. He’s so deep in politics he hasn’t done much in court in the past few years. On the other hand, Bannister would like the smell of this case.”
“Those were my thoughts. Give old Wilcox a call.” Alexander said in reference to Bannister’s clerk.
“I can’t promise results.”
“Well, have at it, anyhow.”
Josephson turned at the door. “Is Abraham Cady daft?”
“The Americans would call it, ballsy.”
Wilcox was a shrewd barrister’s clerk of forty years’ standing, beginning as a messenger boy and working his way through menial jobs in The Temple from third assistant cleric on up.
For thirty-five years he had been in chambers in the Paper Buildings, Inner Temple, entering almost the same day as the young junior Thomas Bannister. Over the decades he had grown with his master, helping him achieve a near unmatched eminence at the bar, take silk as a Q.C., growing in the political field, being named a cabinet minister, and now groomed as a possible future prime minister of Britain. In chambers with seven thriving juniors, at a fee of 2
1
/
2
per cent Wilcox was among the wealthier clerks in Inner Temple.