The cold continues and I am braving temperatures of minus fifteen. My eyelashes freeze and stick when I step outside. This climate is unsuitable for tender-skinned women of course, so I prefer to think of you at home, soaking your stockings or drawing a bath.
Today I have news to share. I am confirmed to sail on the MV Wilhelm Gustloff, the most impressive ship in the harbor! She is enormous, two hundred and eight meters long, fifty-six meters high, and only eight years old. A true beauty. She was originally built for vacation cruising and has amenities I think you would enjoy, such as a pool, a formal dining room, a ballroom, and a library. But ho, let me tickle your thoughts with this—the ship even has a movie theater, a music room, a beauty salon, and a promenade deck completely enclosed in glass. Can you imagine? All of the cabins are the same, except the private luxury suite on B deck for the Führer himself. Perhaps I’ll be invited to lodge in the private cabin at some point, but I must decline. Sacrifices, Lore. I am making these types of sacrifices every day, allowing others to eat from my spoon.
I imagine the Gustloff was once quite pretty for leisure cruising, but the ship is now painted a chalky gray for the war effort. It once served as a hospital ship but was most recently used as barracks for a submarine training school. No matter, she is my boat now.
Yes, how fortunate I am to be a sailor of priority, taking voyage on a grand ship instead of digging tank trenches like most of the lads my age. My services are quite in demand, so I must close. I will leave you, however, with the most impressive fact of all—the capacity of the ship is 1,463 but I am told we may have as many as 2,000 on board.
Imagine, my darling, your Alfred is saving two thousand lives.
“Have you cleaned the toilets yet, Frick?”
“Not yet,” I replied.
florian
I sat in the corner, watching. They didn’t have much food, but what they had, they shared. The small boy discovered an old gramophone and dragged it across the floor. He found a single disc, a Swedish starlet named Zarah Leander singing “Davon geht die Welt nicht unter.” They played the record over and over. The squatty shoemaker made the giant woman dance with him. For his age, he was a good dancer, much better than she was.
I remembered dancing.
Dr. Lange had asked me to accompany his daughter to two balls. Unfortunately, I was a better dancer than she was and it made her angry. She was a selfish girl with a nose like a woodpecker.
The nurse walked over to me. “It’s only bean soup, but it’s warm.” She held out the cup.
“Give it to the girl,” I told her.
“She’s already had some. Take it, you’ll feel weaker tomorrow if you don’t eat something.”
I took the cup from her.
She sat down next to me, uninvited. “I’ve heard this song before. I know she’s singing in German, but I don’t completely understand the lyrics,” she said.
I spooned the warm soup into my mouth. “She’s saying it’s not the end of the world.”
The nurse folded her legs up under her skirt and rested her chin on her knees. “Well, that’s good to know. It’s nice to hear music. At the hospital, we sometimes played music for the patients. The soldiers loved the song ‘Lili Marleen.’” She looked at me. “Do you know it?”
“No,” I lied.
“It’s beautiful. It’s about a boy who longs to see his sweetheart.”
I wasn’t going to correct her, but the song was based on a poem written by a German soldier during the first war. The song was about him meeting his girl under a lamppost. Then he leaves for war. By lantern under a barricade he thinks of his Lili of the lamplight.
“So you like to dance,” she said. It was more of a comment than a question.
“Me? No.”
The shoemaker glided over to us. “Come, my dear Lithuanian, let us have a dance.” He extended his knobby hand to the nurse. “Do you understand what she is singing?”
“Of course.” She smiled. “She’s saying it’s not the end of the world.”
“Very good! Let us dance and celebrate. Tonight we sleep as aristocrats,” said the shoe poet.
“I doubt the aristocrats slept on the cold floor,” the nurse whispered to me before accepting Poet’s hand. I wanted to laugh, to keep talking with her, but instead I said nothing.