THE GREEN KING (part 15)
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The Photographer
from Salzburg
‘Of course, my
young David, we can always, all other matters not with standing, take an
interest in your young protégé. All in all, we don’t have more than a few
hundred thousand war criminal feverishly awaiting the demonstration of our
concern. A mere trifle. Without taking into account these million of mens,
womens, and children already dead, dying, or about to die.
He had a taste
for peroration and a sadistic desire to nail in place with his sarcasm any
person with whom he was speaking. Nevertheless, the young Austrian’s story must
have interested him. Two days later, on May 10, he went to see the boy for the
first time. To the Kapos who were present, he spoke Russian, German, Polish,
Hungarian. He cast a quick glance at the stranger.
It was enough.
He reacted as
David Settiniaz had, with a sizable difference; he was similary struck by him,
but the knew why. He discovered a striking resemblance of the eyes of the
survivor to those of a man with whom he had spoken briefly at Princeton, during
a luncheon at Albert Einstein’s house: the physicist Julius Robert Oppenheimer.
Same pale irises, same impenetrable depth, opening on to a dream inaccessible
to common mortals. Similar mystery, similar genius..?.
With the
difference that this kid at most eighteen or nineteen years old, he thought.
During the next
few days, George Tarras and David Settiniaz devoted themselves to the task that
had brought them to the Mauthausen. Detective work most of the time conducting
investigations based on denunciations. They endeavoured to make a list of all
those who had, at any level, had any responsibility for the running of the
camp. And gathered evidence to be used later, before a court martial dealing
specifically with car crimes in Dachau and Mathausen. As the American troops
approached, many of the former Austrian camp guards south refuge in the
immediate area, without taking any particular precautions, keeping their real
names, hiding behind the virtue of obedience – Befehl ist Befehl – an order is an order – which for them
justified everything. Lacking means and personnel, Tarras recruited former
prisoners. One of them was Jewish architect, a survivor of several camps, Simon
Wiesenthal.
TO BE CONTINUED
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I LOVE YOU…
I LOVE YOU…
I LOVE YOU…
I LOVE YOU…
I LOVE YOU…
I LOVE YOU…
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