Sergeant Gruber and his men had bundled Willi into the car and driven him back to the station. His head was bloodied, one eye was swollen shut. Just breathing hurt. He thought some ribs might be broken.
They put him in a holding cell, and handed him over to the Gestapo the next morning. The Gestapo sentenced him immediately to what was known as ‘protective custody,’ an arbitrary and indefinite sentence for the protection of German society from its ruinous elements. There was no trial. There never would be.
In Dachau, Willi’s personal information was taken down. His photograph was taken. He was stripped naked and given a perfunctory physical examination. Despite the huge purple and black bruises covering his body, his eye swollen shut, the cuts across his face, he was pronounced healthy and fit for work. His clothes were taken away. He was assigned a number, and given new striped prison clothes. The striped pants were too short. The striped jacket, also too small, had the red triangle badge and his number – 27944 – sewn on. The red triangle indicated he was a political prisoner, which meant that he, along with the Jews, was subject to the least consideration and the worst treatment.
Dachau the camp, in the village of the same name, had been opened in 1933 in a refurbished munitions factory. At first it was a ‘labor camp’ for career criminals, political criminals, the so-called ‘work shy,’ Jehovah’s Witnesses, and other general misfits. There were few Jews at first. And in the beginning some inmates were released once their sentences were done. Some prison guards had even showed sympathy toward the prisoners, but those days were over.
In addition to the new barracks, the prisoners were building roads and other facilities, including a swimming pool for the resident SS officers. They were preparing the fields around the camp for cultivation. It was all being done at a punishing pace. SS Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler had taken over the running of Germany’s prisons and prison camps and he had come up with a brilliant plan. Himmler realized you could house prisoners in inadequate quarters, feed them starvation rations, work them without mercy, and as they died, you could replace them with new ‘workers.’ The prisoners would be building the camp while at the same time ridding German society of its worst elements. There was an almost unlimited supply of disposable labor, especially once foreigners and Jews started showing up.
Of course, the success of Himmler’s plan depended in large part on a new generation of guards, the SS Death’s Head units, who could be trained to be merciless and brutal. They were not necessarily hardened sadists to begin with. But having been recruited as impressionable and insecure young men, boys even, they were malleable and, with the proper training, could be turned into killers.
Hans Loritz had recently taken over as Dachau’s Oberführer, its commandant. He liked to assemble the young guards and officers from time to time for a motivational speech. They stood at attention in their grey uniforms, jodhpurs tucked into their heavy boots, the death’s head on the collars of their smart tunics, their fresh faces eager, their eyes shining.
Loritz stood facing them, feet wide apart, hands on his hips, his senior staff lined up behind him. ‘Comrades of the SS!’ he said. ‘You are here because you are the Reich’s future, its promise, its best hope. And your mission is to assure the Führer’s vision for Germany.
‘Always remember, your assignment here will place you among the dregs of human society, the worst of the worst: criminals, Jews, traitors, pig dogs all. Do not be fooled by what looks like a gentle face. Behind it lurks the heart of a pig. Stand fast, hold firm. Do not allow your decent German spirit to be misled.
‘There is no room here for sympathy or kindness or patience toward these pig dogs. Always remember that there are no human beings here, only swine. If any of you does not wish to see blood, you should go home immediately. And most of all remember this: no one who does harm to a prisoner need fear reprimand. After all, the more you shoot, the fewer we have to feed. Also, I am opposed to torture for the Jews. Bugs are not exterminated by tearing out their legs, but are stamped upon.’
The young SS guards lived in close quarters in special barracks. They trained together, had their meals together, socialized only with one another, and, at the same time, competed with one another for the favor of their officers. To win favor you had to be the hardest, the most brutal, the most relentless. You had to drive every sense of mercy and kindness from your mind. There was only room here for the merciless, the unforgiving.
If a prisoner fell, he was to be beaten until he stood. And if he couldn’t stand, you could beat him to death. Those SS men who weren’t hard enough, who showed even the faintest traces of sympathy, the slightest hesitation at committing meaningless and horrifying violence, would be ridiculed, held in contempt, and driven from the ranks in disgrace.
Outside
Hans Bergemann had arrived at the office early. He was busying himself with the contents of his briefcase, looking for his latest notes on the serial-killer case, when Sergeant Gruber came marching in.
‘Well, Bergemann,’ crowed Gruber. ‘Guess what.’
‘What, Sergeant?’
‘I caught Geismeier.’
Bergemann had known all along that this might happen, and if it did, it would happen suddenly, when he least expected it. Willi was shrewd and clever, but his pursuit of the serial killer had been reckless. He had been obsessed. He wouldn’t let go of the thing until he caught the killer or was caught himself. Bergemann had been bracing himself for a long time against just this moment.
Still, there was no way he could have been ready. He had seen Willi only the day before. He certainly hadn’t thought it could be Gruber who
