But Eva knew her place. She had to be subservient or lose her job. And she didn’t expected special treatment. In fact I think she believed that reprimands should be cheerfully received and that the actions and judgement of her employer shouldn’t be questioned.
In the wintertime our flat was never warm enough. To keep us from freezing a fire had to be kept going all the time. Eva had that job and on some nights while up would comfort Niki or me. She would end up holding us until we went to sleep. During the day we knew how to control the situation and would set off alarms. We’d run around the room, daring her to catch us. While we’d wake her at night, neither of our parents would stir. Often we’d try Eva’s patience.
Eva came to us highly recommended and won a place in our hearts. She unquestionably had a knack for working with children, and we loved her as much as we did our mother. She potty trained us. Dressed us, fed us, and saw to our needs. She was the one who taught us our dos and don’ts. She disciplined us in a way that pleased our parents. She did her best to instill in us Christian values and never talked about what it meant to be a Jew.
Under Eva Marie’s tutelage we learned about playing fair: surmising then that it paid to turn the other cheek. How wrong that was, particularly when it came to how Austria and Germany were treated. Then as soon as the Nazi’s assault on the Jews began we learned that fairness only applied to Christians.
Neither Mama nor Papa treated our Jewish servant with the scorn that one would’ve expected. Both of them considered it their good fortune to have her and indeed rewarded her in many different ways. Then what more could they have done for her? How could they have treated her better? In light of what happened later these were questions that couldn’t be simply answered by expressions of appreciation. She became a member of the family. But did that give my father an excuse for being overly solicitous?
Each morning impatiently we’d wait for our mother. We knew nothing about her evening activities and settled into our morning routine after Eva fed us our hot cocoa and hard rolls. She’d then comb our hair in preparation for the little time our mother would spend with us. Sometimes our father would approach us with a smile, but his smiles meant less to us than smiles from our mother.
It was from Eva that we received the most warmth. Without many words she could communicate her philosophy of life. However because of her tight reign we rebelled and resisted the rules when we could get away with it. We’d kick and scream when it came to taking a bath, but our screams were ignored. I can’t recall when bathing was simple. A large porcelain basin filled with water would mean the inevitable, while one of us would try to delay it by playing hide-and-seek.
Again and again we’d get slapped across the face; again and again our father would hit us and call it character building. The slapping was no doubt vicious and often hard enough to leave handprints. Had he been less calculating he could’ve really hurt us. In some respects the slapping seemed an outgrowth of love and affection.
The way our father punished us wasn’t contrary to our mother’s ideas about child rearing. His methods were handed down from generation to generation. We heard that from our parents and about how they were slapped as children. Even when we could see that our mother found fault with how our father treated us she never said anything. This was during a period when we watched what we said to each other. Candor would’ve been preferable, but we couldn’t chance it. Our lives were centered on secrets, while considering our father’s temperament it never seemed unwise to keep them. I’m sure the viciousness of the man she married disturbed our mother very much.
But we were always afraid that she would leave him. Yes, she seemed committed to the idea of marriage, though I suspect not to the marriage itself.
Eva Marie enjoyed getting us ready for school. It was a routine that rarely varied, and we wouldn’t have been happy without a quick hug from our mother (though we knew she would’ve preferred to stay in bed). We were still very young, and I don’t think she expected anything from us. So all we got were quick hugs, though we stood in awe of her and would do almost anything for her attention. Our feelings for her stood in stark contrast with the frustrations and conflicts we associated with our father. Then so harsh in his manner and his tone he showed no remorse for mistreating us, a pattern I suppose that affected many other people.
Some nights nightmares kept Niki awake. My first act would be to try to plug my ears. It was true that we both expected the worse at all times. I thought I knew what the nightmares were about. And as he got over them he’d share with me the terror. There were times when I knew he knew I had betrayed him and he blamed himself for trusting me. Certainly he and I were close and admired each other, but sometimes I’d do something to him that would surprise me.
Betrayal wasn’t that unusual. It seemed as if almost everybody had their share of it; and the trouble people were in as much as anything else had to do with who they were. And don’t think we didn’t know what was going on. Our parents couldn’t have sheltered us and wouldn’t have tried. Soon the news would get worse because there already were Nazis out there capitalizing on the discontent. The pleasant Viennese atmosphere was being poisoned by personal and political strife.
Randy Ford
