The first item I took out of the box was a Luger pistol. It was wrapped in a black cloth. I unwrapped the gun and hefted it in my hand. Black and deadly, smelling of gun oil. I had cleaned and oiled it two days before. I possessed two full magazines for the pistol, as well as a pouch holding several dozen loose shells. One of the magazines was lodged in the butt of the gun, ready for firing. The intoxicating sense of power holding the Luger gave me could only be appreciated by those who had experienced true powerlessness.
The gun had belonged to an SS officer whom I had met in a bar in Hamburg in late 1946. A few beers had loosened his tongue, and he had bragged about what he had done to Jews in Ukraine as the German army swept eastward toward Russia. Later that night, I broke into his home, finding him alone in his bed. A smile curled my lips as I recalled his look of astonishment when, a moment before I killed him, I'd revealed that I was a Jew.
I set the gun on the bed, reached into the box, and took out a switchblade hunting knife with a swastika stenciled on its pearl handle. I had taken the knife from another Nazi officer, this one in Munich, after I had shot him in the back of the head.
I pressed the release button. The blade sprang into view with a dull twang. Not long, but made from sturdy metal, the kind that could lodge itself in bone without breaking. The blade glinted as it caught the light. Reflected in the shiny steel, my left eye stared back at me. I could read nothing in my gaze, or maybe I did not wish to. I quickly shifted the angle of the weapon so it reflected something other than myself.
I had often wondered why I held on to these two weapons. I could easily have found replacements for them. But both the Luger and the knife were special to me. They were reminders that I was no longer the weak, pathetic creature that I had been reduced to in Auschwitz. They were symbols of the time I had set forth on my journey of vengeance, when I had brought some of my—and my people's—oppressors to justice. They helped me alleviate some of the guilt I felt for surviving while the rest of my family, and so many others, did not.
I swept the knife through the air, describing glittering arcs of deadliness. It felt like a natural extension of my arm. Then I placed it on the bed by the Luger. My eyes shifted from one weapon to the other as I considered which I should take with me tonight.
The Luger was tempting. It would certainly send a forceful message. But it was also risky. Having a gun brought you one step closer to using it, and this might spell trouble, not just for me, but also for Rachel Weiss. A gunshot is deadlier than a knife wound. Rachel Weiss had not hired me to kill anyone. Not to mention the idea of having to dispose of a body did not fill me with enthusiasm.
And besides, I was certain I could make do without it.
The knife, then.
I wrapped the Luger in its cloth and placed it back in the box. I folded the knife and slid it into my pocket. Then my eyes fell on another item I had acquired in Germany. A leather billfold, brown and creased, with a small metal J stamped into its top-right corner. I brought the billfold to my nose and inhaled its scent. Smoke, faint but unmistakable. What fire had impressed its scent on the billfold? Was it the fire of battle? Or the firebombing of some German city? Or was this the smell of Jewish bodies being put to the torch?
I did not know and would never find out. The previous owner of the billfold was dead. I had done the killing. He'd lived alone in a picturesque hamlet outside Frankfurt. When I told him who I was and why I had come to see him, he spat at me. The spittle missed. I did not.
As he lay dying in his blood, I ransacked his house. I found the billfold in the inner pocket of a jacket hanging in his bedroom closet.
I opened it and drew out its contents. First was the money. A sheaf of bills, mostly German and French and Dutch notes in various denominations, but also some Swiss francs. There used to be more, but I had used some to pay rent on the apartment for a year in advance and to procure various black-market goods. In fact, it was through a black-market money changer that I exchanged this money for Israeli liras.
Second, and most important among all my German souvenirs, was the picture. It showed an elegant woman in a conservative gray dress, a gold necklace at her throat, and two children, a boy of eight and a girl of five. The girl had dimples. The boy a gap-toothed grin. All were fair-haired. All were smiling at the camera. A perfect German family.
Why had I taken the picture?
Perhaps I'd wanted to take something from that Nazi officer that was even more personal and valuable than his life.
And why did I hang onto it for as long as I did?
I think I simply liked having a family photo to look at from time to time, since I no longer had any of my own.
