My mother and I became very attached to him, more than to any of the other official guests who came to our place. He was the most sincere of all those German officers and functionaries who liked her landscapes. My sister and I began to call him Onkel Willi, without being asked to, without any embarrassment, practically from the first visit he made to our house.
I remember once when my mother was praising Oberführer Ganz for the sincere interest he showed in us children that my father said, âPerhaps he laughs too easily.â But he himself laughed when he said it. When I think of poor Ganz after all this time I remember not a set of features but his laughter, which wasnât maniacal on the one hand or careful and mannered on the other. It was like the laughter of a man who doesnât have an enemy in the world. And this from an SS Oberführer, member of a legion of which the world has ever since made a bogey.
He was of medium height, athletically built, and beginning to lose his black hair from a rounded, expansive skull. He was the sort of adult who liked to produce little presents from his pocket at times when bedtime is close and a child thinks the main delights of the evening are over. My sister and I became infatuated with Ganz, as far as I can remember, late in the summer of my parentsâ return to Belorussia. (To us children it seemed like a return too, though we had never been there before.) The Soviet Union was about to fallâeveryone knew that and was excited by the idea, and the atmosphere of cosmic carnival the news created was universal. The Soviet Army had been decimated. We had visible proof of thatâtwo great mounds beside the Staroviche-Baranovichi road under which, as even my sister and I knew, though our parents were not the type to bring such brutal facts to our attention, lay the two Russian brigades who had tried to fight the Germans for Staroviche. Everyone was quoting the saying that the Russian defeat was so absolute that all the Germans had had to do was kick in the door and the whole rotten structure had tumbled in. News that Stalin had been killed by his own people in besieged Moscow was expected daily.
It was safe at that stage for a German official to accompany the wives of the newly installed mayor and police chief of Staroviche, together with the children of both women, on a picnic to the Brudezh forest north of the city. The mayor by the way was Franz Kuzich, one of those whose families had holidayed with us at Puck. Kuzich came from a Germanophile family, and his three children also carried German namesâRuta, Bernhardt, Kirsten. They were all knowing adolescents. Bernhardt did not share even the same jokes as I did, would not have been seen dead laughing at them. Kirsten was a year older than my sister Genia and used that margin as an excuse for cutting her dead.
Ganzâs picnic was a triumph for us because the Oberführer wouldnât allow any of the Kuzich childrenâs air of higher wisdom and knowledge to prevail. If they wanted to play with Ganz, Ganz wanted to play like a child. Therefore they had to consent to become children again. I remember still how I loved the man for delivering us like that, for making us fashionable with the Kuzich children, who might be unfashionably overweight like their mother but whose opinions meant everything to Genia and me. Ganz wanted hiding games and chasing games; and as I ran, the woods blurred, a delightful deep-green haze; and when I hid, I caressed the bark of the larch trees and the birch; and as Ganzâs pursuing laughter bounced from branch to branch, I thought, This is Belorussia, this is why we had to come back, to make childhood possible.
Once I ran, looking the other way, shoulder-first into Ganz, who grabbed me by the shoulders and clamped me to his chest. He wasnât wearing his coat and his shirt was white and fragrant. I could smell his perfume, a mild, male-smelling perfume, and behind
I remember once when my mother was praising Oberführer Ganz for the sincere interest he showed in us children that my father said, âPerhaps he laughs too easily.â But he himself laughed when he said it. When I think of poor Ganz after all this time I remember not a set of features but his laughter, which wasnât maniacal on the one hand or careful and mannered on the other. It was like the laughter of a man who doesnât have an enemy in the world. And this from an SS Oberführer, member of a legion of which the world has ever since made a bogey.
He was of medium height, athletically built, and beginning to lose his black hair from a rounded, expansive skull. He was the sort of adult who liked to produce little presents from his pocket at times when bedtime is close and a child thinks the main delights of the evening are over. My sister and I became infatuated with Ganz, as far as I can remember, late in the summer of my parentsâ return to Belorussia. (To us children it seemed like a return too, though we had never been there before.) The Soviet Union was about to fallâeveryone knew that and was excited by the idea, and the atmosphere of cosmic carnival the news created was universal. The Soviet Army had been decimated. We had visible proof of thatâtwo great mounds beside the Staroviche-Baranovichi road under which, as even my sister and I knew, though our parents were not the type to bring such brutal facts to our attention, lay the two Russian brigades who had tried to fight the Germans for Staroviche. Everyone was quoting the saying that the Russian defeat was so absolute that all the Germans had had to do was kick in the door and the whole rotten structure had tumbled in. News that Stalin had been killed by his own people in besieged Moscow was expected daily.
It was safe at that stage for a German official to accompany the wives of the newly installed mayor and police chief of Staroviche, together with the children of both women, on a picnic to the Brudezh forest north of the city. The mayor by the way was Franz Kuzich, one of those whose families had holidayed with us at Puck. Kuzich came from a Germanophile family, and his three children also carried German namesâRuta, Bernhardt, Kirsten. They were all knowing adolescents. Bernhardt did not share even the same jokes as I did, would not have been seen dead laughing at them. Kirsten was a year older than my sister Genia and used that margin as an excuse for cutting her dead.
Ganzâs picnic was a triumph for us because the Oberführer wouldnât allow any of the Kuzich childrenâs air of higher wisdom and knowledge to prevail. If they wanted to play with Ganz, Ganz wanted to play like a child. Therefore they had to consent to become children again. I remember still how I loved the man for delivering us like that, for making us fashionable with the Kuzich children, who might be unfashionably overweight like their mother but whose opinions meant everything to Genia and me. Ganz wanted hiding games and chasing games; and as I ran, the woods blurred, a delightful deep-green haze; and when I hid, I caressed the bark of the larch trees and the birch; and as Ganzâs pursuing laughter bounced from branch to branch, I thought, This is Belorussia, this is why we had to come back, to make childhood possible.
Once I ran, looking the other way, shoulder-first into Ganz, who grabbed me by the shoulders and clamped me to his chest. He wasnât wearing his coat and his shirt was white and fragrant. I could smell his perfume, a mild, male-smelling perfume, and behind
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